


And Still The World Spins

by LingeringLilies



Series: Spins/Jumper [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Universe, F/F, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-11-05
Packaged: 2018-09-16 23:17:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 47,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9294107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LingeringLilies/pseuds/LingeringLilies
Summary: The evolution of Alex Danvers from the day she first learns aliens are real to the moment she knows she and Maggie Sawyer are in love.





	1. Ellipse

**Author's Note:**

> This is a pre-canon/canon compliant story that will wind through what we know of Alex's backstory, fill in the gaps we don't know, and show what happens between the scenes once she meets Maggie.
> 
> I am nothing without my lifelong beta @youreterriblemuriel. Thanks also to @tikerion for her fresh eyes.

Midvale is not an exciting place. At least, it isn’t for the first thirteen years of Alex’s life. The lull of predictability renders her restless, uneasy with the complacency of everyone around her.

How could they be satisfied with so little when there’s an entire universe of knowledge and adventure to conquer?

Alex feels like a hamster in a wheel, constantly spinning, spinning, spinning. The only moments she’s still are laying on a blanket in the backyard with her father, listening to him talk about galaxies far away, pointing to comets and quizzing Alex on which celestial bodies are planets and which are stars. Alex’s mind runs wild with thoughts of those star galaxies, far from the Milky Way, each containing innumerable things she could someday know. 

These galaxies are perfect, moving in absolute harmony to ensure their existence. If a single planet were to shift even a fraction of an inch in its orbit, the entire galaxy would collapse.

To Alex, minds are like galaxies; each one moves with its own orbits and gravities, its own configurations of planets and moons. Alex thinks about the speed of thought, and how walking through the halls at Midvale Junior High is like walking through a universe of strange thought galaxies, each moving in its own cycle and rhythm.

She takes a smug pleasure in correcting her teachers, and when she doesn’t know the answer, it’s usually because the question doesn’t make sense. In third grade she’d been skipped to fourth, and if Alex hadn’t known how smart she was, she might have thought it was because her teacher was just tired of her. 

But even in fourth grade she was restless, uninspired by the asinine projects about California history and intro to social studies. She didn’t care about threads of gold in a river or ancient civilizations. She wanted to know the movements of galaxies, the electric currents of thought, the function of all things in the world as it is  _ now _ , and how things might be someday.

Alex accumulates awards and trophies and certificates for every science fair and spelling bee and academic decathlon Midvale has to offer. She places each one on her shelf, collecting the proud hugs and smiles of her parents, placing these invisible achievements next to the trophies. She stares at them as she lies in bed, wondering if they will be all she ever has to show for the vastness inside her head.

Her mind moves in calculations and algorithms before she knows what an algorithm is. She deciphers why certain kids don’t want to sit with her at lunch; she’s too smart and too fast for them, and her pontifications on cellular regeneration and the possibilities presented by the Human Genome Project make them feel small. When she can’t find someone to sit with, she uses lunch to do her work in an empty classroom, tearing through it as though she were being timed, trying not to get mustard smudges on the pristine pages.

Alex’s mind galaxy has planets that orbit faster than any in the universe, save for maybe her mom’s and dad’s. She prides herself on this. If all galaxies worked as well as hers, the world wouldn’t have stupid people like Rick Treewater - and his friends who always make her feel like they’re whispering about her - in it.

Alex tries not to care about them. Theirs are, after all, inferior minds. She doesn’t find she has much in common with her female classmates either. At the end of the day she feels like a planet with an atypical orbit, never quite settling into a ring like everyone else. 

But it’s lonely. So very lonely. 

In seventh grade she decides she’s done being the smart girl with no friends. She hides her intellect and tries to make headway into as many groups as she can. She’s mean enough to be accepted on the fringe of the popular kids, brainy enough to sit with the smart kids, dramatic enough to fit in with the theater kids, and athletic enough to get in with the jocks. But she never breaks into any of these groups, no matter how much she tries.

* * *

Alex accepts her parents’ careers as nondescript “scientists” until she turns twelve and starts asking what kind of science they do. She’s never satisfied with their answers, feeling like they’re just trying to placate her. When she pushes, they use big words they think she won’t understand. When she looks them up, they don’t make sense; hydrophysics has nothing to do with biomagnetism and a person studying metacognition wouldn’t be the least bit interested in paleontology.

So she starts snooping. Not because she’s defiant. She’s genuinely curious. And perhaps a little defiant. But if they would just tell her the truth, she wouldn’t have to figure things out for herself.

Her sleuthing yields nothing she can draw clues from other than some altered maps of the Andromeda galaxy and a sheet of numerical sequencing labeled  _ Known Species _ .

It isn’t until Alex gets sick at school one day in eighth grade that she stumbles upon her first clue that her parents might be more than traditional scientists.

She’s felt weird and clammy since waking up, but her mother pats her shoulder and says Alex is brave enough to face the girls she’s been having conflicts with at lunch. And while those girls have definitely been on Alex’s mind, she really does feel sick. But she’s sent to school despite that, and only after she’s vomited into the sink in Algebra does the nurse call her mom.

Eliza comes to pick her up, a rush of apologies and questions, hands dabbing at her forehead and cheeks. She shepherds Alex into the car, buckling her in like she used to when Alex was little.

“I’m so sorry, sweetie, but we have to stop at the office for a few minutes,” Eliza says. “I was in the middle of a meeting and I need to grab some files before we go home.”

Alex tips her head back against the seat, feeling weak and achy all over, and gives a faint nod. All she wants to do is go home to her bed and watch MTV so she knows what music videos her classmates are talking about. But she doesn’t really have a choice.

Alex has only been to her parents’ office a few times when carpool and various handoffs to babysitters and friends necessitated it. Eliza offers to let Alex wait in the car, but she wants to see it, even if the world is spinning around her. Whatever bug she has sure is making her dizzy.

She hauls herself out of her seat, feeling ten times heavier than she usually does, and slogs through the automatic doors into the medical office building. Everything seems smaller than she remembers. They ride up the elevator, and when they reach Eliza’s office, Eliza beckons her inside in a hushed voice, pulling out a chair and tapping it, gesturing for Alex to sit. Alex slumps down, noting where the trash can is in case she needs to vomit again, before closing her eyes.

She is so tired.

She hears her mother shuffling a few papers around, clicking through things on her electric blue iMac. Alex makes a game of guessing what her mother is doing based on the noises she hears.

She must be doing a convincing job of pretending to be asleep, because after ten minutes, Eliza gets up and quietly leaves the room. Alex might not have noticed if the latch hadn’t clicked next to her head.

Her eyes spring open and she takes in the space, a few piles of papers moved to different parts of the desk, her mother’s water bottle stuffed back in her purse, the computer awake and running its generic beach scene screensaver.

Alex realizes that this is her best chance to see what her mother does.

Carefully, her body straining with the effort and ache of being sick, Alex stands and stumbles to the desk. She blinks, willing her eyes not to be so blurry.

She’s able to make out a few words on a chart and frowns. At the top of the spreadsheet is a set of columns labeled “Species” and “Chemical Base,” followed by a full breakdown of biological taxonomy, with a final column labeled “Extinct?”. Attached are pages and pages of data on creatures Alex has never heard of:  _ K’hunds _ and  _ Trombusans _ and  _ Almeracians _ . She flips through, hoping to find an explanation, wondering what it means that a Kryptonian was “invulnerable” when she hears muted footsteps a few feet outside the door, followed by the click of the latch and the door swinging open.

Alex tries to put the papers back on the desk where she found them, but she misses and they slip and fall to the ground with a ruffled sound. 

“ _ Alexandra _ ,” Eliza gasps.

Alex is frozen, caught red-handed snooping in her mother’s work.

Eliza takes her in for a minute, glancing at the papers Alex dropped before giving a tense smile. “Feeling any better?”

Alex nods dumbly, hoping her flu-addled brain can still chronicle some of the words she’d just read. 

A few weeks later her parents sit her down and explain everything she’s been trying to figure out for the last year. Yes, they’re scientists, and yes, they study living organisms, but those life forms are creatures from other planets, some from other galaxies. 

So, aliens. 

If Alex were less intelligent, she might struggle to accept that there are alien life forms in the universe, and that her parents study them. But she  _ is _ intelligent, and she knows that the statistical probability of Earth being the only inhabitable planet in the entire universe is akin to a monkey in a room with a typewriter banging out  _ War and Peace _ .

She takes the news of aliens in stride, filled with so many questions she almost lifts out of her seat in excitement. Her parents smile and look relieved.

Alex thinks she’ll have questions for them for the rest of her life, but her mother holds her arms out, beckoning Alex in, and even though Alex is at an age where hugging her mom is uncool, she lets her parents hold her, soaking up all their love and adoration and pride.

Maybe if she’d known what was coming next, she would have made the hug last forever.

She sits back in her chair and her parents glance at each other in a way that means Alex should brace herself.

“We’re going to have a visitor,” Eliza says, gently as though she doesn’t want to hurt Alex’s feelings or frighten her.

“An _alien_?” Alex asks, ratcheting up in excitement. 

Her parents almost smile, but they catch themselves. “Technically, yes, though it looks human.”

Alex is a little disappointed at that - what use is it having an alien visitor if she can’t even tell? - but she goes with it.

“She’s going to live with us while we help her get used to life on Earth. We’re going to need your help.”

Alex swallows and nods eagerly. 

She’s never felt so grown up and trusted. She gets to help them with a real live alien! Right there in their home!

She starts preparing straightaway. After confirming the alien can speak and read english, she makes a stack of books for the alien to read, and burns a CD of the best Green Day and Muse and Jimmy Eat World songs. She rearranges her room to accommodate the rollaway, and she picks out the outfit she wants the alien to meet her in.

All the next day Alex waits by her upstairs window, wanting to be the first to see this alien, to see if she can detect some hint of otherness despite the human form. She paces and chews her fingernails, and when she hears something whoosh and land outside, she darts to the window, pulling the curtain aside.

She sees a man in a strange flying suit with a red cape. He looks more than human. Alex gets excited - maybe this alien will take her flying!

But there’s someone with him, someone smaller and meeker with brown hair and a plain white robe.

Alex’s stomach sinks.

She looks so normal. Pale skin, mousy hair, scrawny and about the size of a sixth grader. The alien is just a girl. Aside from her white dress, she looks no different than all the stupid kids at school.

The expression on her face is a little strange. She’s skittish and jumpy and holds herself unlike any person Alex has ever seen. But then again, Alex isn’t exposed to the big wide world outside Midvale. She goes to school, goes to soccer, and comes home to her parents.

But this girl. 

This girl has seen the galaxy before she’s even old enough to babysit. 

Alex understands right away: her parents only want her help because Alex is a teenager and this girl will need to fit in with other teenagers. They don’t actually want Alex to assist with anything important.

Alex is just a teenager, despite every indication that her brain makes her more than that.

Alex’s parents call her downstairs to introduce herself. She sizes the alien up, wondering what’s different about her. She's pretty, but in a kind of plain way that doesn't threaten Alex. She decides she can handle a plain girl staying with them for a while. It'll be nice to have someone around. And the girl is so small, Alex can probably teach her a lot.

The first lesson happens right after dinner. Kara makes a few faces at the taste of the food - Alex has to stifle a laugh because everyone knows her dad is a terrible cook but no one says it - but swallows it with a wince. Alex decides she likes this girl, which is kind of a weird feeling, since she doesn’t like most girls at school besides her friend Vicky. 

After dinner Jeremiah suggests they watch a movie, something calming to help settle Kara into the house. Eliza discusses whether a movie would really be relaxing after a day of so much stimulation, but Jeremiah points out that Kara is no stranger to technology. Surely on Krypton they had something like movies. Civilizations, he points out, use technology first and foremost to record stories. It's critical to their survival almost in the same way food and water are. Eliza relents and they agree to watch something Jeremiah picked up from Blockbuster.

Alex shows Kara how to clear her dishes from the table and bring them to the sink, rinsing and putting them in the dishwasher. Kara is fascinated by the dishwasher, rolling the racks in and out, in and out, asking over and over how it works and if it really gets the dishes clean, back comically straight and eyes wide. 

Before they go into the den to watch the movie, Eliza suggests they make popcorn.

"Extra butter," Alex says, and her mom smiles back.

Eliza gets out the popcorn maker, setting it on the counter and measuring the kernels before pouring them in. A few bounce out and land on the floor, and Kara darts to pick one up, holding it to the light.

"Amazing..." Kara breathes, eyes squinting at the translucent kernel.

Alex smirks, amused that Kara is entertained by a popcorn kernel. But Jeremiah approaches tentatively, looking at it as though eager to see what Kara sees.

"What do you see?"

"It's a- a, um... I don't know the word for it here," Kara stutters. "A possibility?"

Jeremiah follows up with questions about agriculture and farming on Krypton, and Kara looks blank and then nervous when she doesn't know the answers.

"For heaven's sake, Jeremiah, she's only thirteen. Most teenagers don't know anything about farming."

Alex looks down, smug because she knows a lot about farming and agriculture. She did a whole project about the economy in Mozambique and how it would benefit from diversifying its cashew crops to include pecans and macadamia nuts. But she doesn't say anything. She's supposed to be a gracious host.

Eliza plugs the popcorn maker on and it whirs to life, the kernels crashing around inside. Kara looks startled, hands coming up to protect her ears.

"Are you okay?" Jeremiah asks.

Kara yells back at him. "It's... so... loud!" with a pained look on her face.

The three Danvers glance at each other. Sure, the popcorn maker is a little bit loud, but nowhere near as loud as a vacuum or leaf blower.

Kara glances between the three of them, eyes wide and afraid, and Alex doesn't know what to do. She's about to offer to show Kara the TV room when the first kernel pops.

Kara screams and covers her head, darting under the kitchen table as though taking cover during an earthquake drill. She huddles there, shaking and crying for the ten seconds it takes Eliza to unplug the popcorn maker. 

"What on earth…?" Eliza asks, glancing at Jeremiah.

"Her senses," he says, as though realizing just now that the popping of a single kernel must have sounded like an explosion to Kara's amplified hearing.

"Oh, goodness," Eliza says, sounding remorseful. "I didn't even think..."

Alex, however, has already lifted up the tablecloth to see what this strange girl is doing.

"Hey," Alex says tentatively. She's not the best at comforting people. She hasn't been given many opportunities. "You okay?"

Kara shakes her head. "It's... so... loud," she says again, still trembling.

Alex feels bad for this girl. She's so small and so far away from home, and she’s  _ so weird _ .

She hasn’t felt pity for many people in her life, certainly not people at school. But her parents have tasked her with helping this girl, and she’s going to prove that she’s more than just a convenient source of information about teenagers.

“It is loud,” Alex says, crawling under the table and letting the tablecloth cover both of them. 

Kara’s eyes have welled up and a single tear falls down her cheek.

Alex lifts her finger, catching it, wondering if Kryptonian tears have the same molecular structure as human tears.

Kara tilts her head, frowning at Alex’s finger. “Why did you do that?” she asks.

Alex looks up, realizing Kara is puzzled by what any human would understand as an act of comfort. She doesn’t want to admit she was merely curious, so she says, “On earth catching someone’s tears means you care about them.”

“... Catching?” Kara asks as another tear slips down the other cheek.

Alex lifts her finger to wipe this one away, thinking more of compassion than science. “Like that,” Alex says.

Kara licks her lips as they tremble. She looks at the linoleum floor, probably just as strange to her as the popcorn maker, then looks up at Alex. “Can you do it too?”

“Do what?”

“Make tears so I can catch them.”

Despite herself, Alex smiles at Kara’s gesture of caring. “Not on command.” 

“Oh…” Kara seems disappointed. 

Alex places a tentative hand on Kara’s knee. “You can hear things really well, can’t you?”

Kara nods. “There’s something… digging outside in the front green.”

“Grass,” Alex supplies.

“Grass digs,” Kara says, cataloguing the word.

Alex shakes her head, realizing just how strange this girl is. “No, the green outside is grass. It’s a plant. The things you hear digging are probably gophers.”

“Gophers,” Kara echoes. “Are they dangerous?”

“Only to my begonias,” Eliza says warmly, crouching down and lifting the tablecloth. “Kara, dear, I’m sorry I didn’t think about the noise. Why don’t you and Alex go in another room so I can finish making the popcorn and we can watch a movie.”

Kara nods, scrambling out from under the table. Alex doesn’t look at her mother as she climbs out too. She was doing fine. She didn’t need her mother to intervene.

She takes Kara’s hand, noticing it feels just like her own, and shows her where the TV room is. 

Kara sits on the couch with her hands over her ears while the popcorn pops. Alex would think she was being dramatic if it weren’t for the flinches that keep jerking her shoulders whenever Alex can make out a faint pop in the other room. 

Once the popcorn is popped and Kara has started to settle down, Jeremiah comes in the room holding something heavy and gray. He’s borrowed a lead blanket from a neighbor who was a dentist, and he drapes it over Kara, assuring her she’ll be alright, and that when she gets overwhelmed, she can crawl under the blanket and take a break from the constant stimulation of Earth.

Alex wonders what it would feel like to be overwhelmed by a place as boring as Midvale. 

* * *

After three months of living with them, Kara is still struggling with certain vernacular. She uses phrases that don’t make sense, she emphasizes random words for no reason, she mixes metaphors and similes. And she stares, awkward and wide-eyed, at everything she doesn’t know from her home planet. Everything.

Eliza is insistent on Alex including Kara whenever possible, so Alex is forced to bring Kara on the rare occasion she gets invited to the movies or beach. She hates it, hates that all the hard work she’s doing to be cool is being undermined by an alien parasite. Once they get to wherever they’re going, she lets Kara fend for herself, talking to her only as much as necessary, hoping Kara will take the hint and tell Eliza she doesn’t want to go next time. But Alex has no such luck, and Kara becomes her awkward, embarrassing shadow. 

Afterwards, Alex feels guilty about it. From the prolonged looks and folded arms, she thinks her mom knows she isn’t really trying. But her mom can’t do anything about the fact that Kara is uncool. Instead, Alex overcompensates by doting on Kara whenever Eliza is around, offering to help her pick out outfits and pack lunches that aren’t too weird. They flip through catalogs and Alex tells her what’s cool and what’s not, only partially truthful, leaving the best items for herself.

* * *

Having an alien move in isn’t the only big thing that happens to Alex that semester. After being teased for months by a few of her classmates for being a prude, Alex kisses a boy for the first time.

It’s Rick Treewater, the guy in her homeroom everyone agrees is the cutest, so Alex forgives whatever mean things he said about her last year. It’s during a game of Truth or Dare, which Alex doesn’t think is terribly cool, but she’s fourteen and she’d rather earn it this way than go into high school never having been kissed.

His lips are oddly cold and wet and Alex wonders if this is what gave someone the idea to write a story about a princess kissing a frog. It strikes her that maybe Rick is nervous and that’s why the kiss is kind of bad. Maybe if she kisses someone with more experience, it will be better. It has to be.

She laughs with her best friend Vicky about it the next day, and Vicky assures her that yes, it’s  _ soooo _ much better when the guy knows what he’s doing. 

Alex asks Kara if she’s ever been kissed, and takes a certain snide satisfaction when Kara sighs and mumbles that she hasn’t. Alex looks up at the ceiling of their room, feeling like there’s at least a shred of fairness in the world, and thinking perhaps Kara was as weird on her planet as she is here. 

* * *

Rick acts like Alex doesn’t exist after their kiss, which makes Alex obsess over why he doesn’t like her. She knows that one kiss isn’t some magic potion that will cause him to follow her around like a puppy, but she thought it would have some effect. She tries for a few weeks to get his attention. She enlists Vicky’s help in doing her hair in new styles, trying new makeup looks, baring more skin than the dress code allows. But nothing works, which makes Alex even more determined to get his attention.

When she finally does, though, it’s for the worst reason. It’s Kara. Her freaky little shadow who just  _ had _ to make a show of saving that woman and her baby from the car crash at the beach. After a piece of shrapnel hits Alex in the arm and she has to get eleven stitches, Rick suddenly remembers she exists. He makes her a card and puts it in her locker, saying he hopes her arm heals quickly and maybe they could go to a movie sometime. 

After staring at it in confused disbelief for a full minute, Alex folds it up and forgets she ever cared whether he lived or died. 

Boys like Rick are small potatoes. Alex is holding out for something better.

* * *

Kara feels terrible about what happened at the beach, and when Jeremiah gives her a pair of lead-lined glasses to help her control her powers in public, she agrees she shouldn’t use her powers. Alex hopes some of the burden of responsibility for Kara’s keeping will be lifted, but Kara has imprinted on her. She tires of being Kara’s keeper even in private now, wishing Kara actually would start to act cool so other people would want to be around her. But Kara is hopeless, and Alex doesn’t know what’s worse: being home with Kara desperately vying for her attention, or braving the halls of Midvale Junior High, where she’s neither popular nor noticed, save for her one true friend Vicky.

Vicky Donahue is the best thing in Alex’s too-small galaxy. She’s a fellow social drifter whose mind runs faster than most. Alex takes tremendous comfort in it. Together they are always spinning, feeling as though no one can keep up, wondering what stillness is like.

Vicky opens up the world beyond Midvale to Alex. She takes Alex to her first concert to see Alanis Morrissette, sneaks her into her first R-rated movie, and gives Alex her first drink: a swig of cheap vodka in a plastic water bottle in Vickie’s over-cluttered closet. Together they mock everyone at school, erasing whatever taunts were sent their way during the day. Vicky’s hippie parents don’t believe in bedtimes or napkins in laps or grounding their four kids. People are always coming in and out of their house, helping themselves to food and drink, practicing the self-reliance the Donahues hold in highest esteem. As a result, Vicky is fiercely independent. Some would call her rebellious, but without anything to rebel against, she seems to Alex to be the most confident, expressive, feisty person in Midvale. Alex hangs on her every word, and in return she’s given the thing she covets most: Vicky’s friendship and approval.

If that weren’t reason enough to spend as much time as possible together, Kara isn’t interested in going to Vicky’s house because it’s too chaotic and loud. Alex retreats there often, complaining about Kara as they make collages from torn out pictures of  _ Seventeen _ and  _ YM _ , gluing them directly to the walls of Vicky’s room and staying up all night watching marathons of  _ Undressed _ and  _ Dawson’s Creek _ before crawling into Vicky’s bed. Alex wishes she could move in and sleep in Vickie’s bed every night.

Kara must be able to tell Alex is frustrated with her, because she starts apologizing constantly. When she startles at a loud noise or closes a book too hard or tosses something too far across the room or runs up the stairs too fast, Alex knows an apology will follow. Alex wonders if her powers include being able to hear every time Alex rolls her eyes, because it always seems to incite an apology. Alex resists whatever pity and compassion she feels for Kara, which might make her feel heartless, but there is suddenly so little space for Alex in her own house. Dinner conversations always center around Kara: what she learned that day, how she’s feeling, praising every little effort she makes to pass as human. Alex’s success in both school and sports feels irrelevant and pathetically human. She tries not to get upset about it - she’s too tough to need anyone’s approval - but she does. One night, when she thinks Kara is asleep, she lets herself cry. She misses her old life, her old family, her old self. She doesn’t like feeling mean and selfish for wanting her parents’ attention and time to herself.

She feels stupid when Kara wakes up. Of course she heard her. Kara hears everything.

“Alex, what’s wrong?” Kara says, distressed that Alex is upset.

“Nothing,” Alex snaps at her.

“But you’re crying.”

“Leave me  _ alone _ .”

“Okay…” Kara says, and her voice holds another apology. “But if you want someone to catch your tears...”

Alex sniffles and feels bad, and she lets out a resigned sigh. Kara is here, and if she’s not careful, she’s going to make their living situation terrible.

“I don’t need anyone to catch my tears,” Alex mutters. 

“Okay… Is there something else I could do?”

“Do you have the power to make my life not suck?”

“No…” Kara says, and her dismay tells Alex Kara thinks she’s being serious. “But maybe we could try something else.”

“Like what?”

“Like… I could take you flying.”

Alex’s tears stop abruptly.  _ Flying _ ? It’s a crazy idea, and their parents would be furious. 

Furious… at Kara. 

Kara, who isn’t supposed to use her powers because it puts her and the people around her in danger. Kara, who will get in trouble for endangering Alex specifically. Maybe her parents will finally see that Alex is the victim here.

Alex knows she might get in trouble too. But if they actually manage to pull it off, it will be the single most exciting thing she’s ever done.

And she’s right. It is. They fly over the town, over the nearby towns, out over the ocean, and Alex forgets about getting Kara in trouble. Alex is  _ freezing _ , but for the first time she feels like she’s moving at the same speed as her mind. She can see the grids of each town, see the order of fields and orchards, the long patterns of wind on the water. Things make sense from high above. 

They’re flying, euphoric, and it seems too soon that Kara brings them back to Midvale.

Eliza and Jeremiah are waiting for them, furious. But rather than launch into a rant at Kara, how irresponsible it was for her to take Alex out, they focus on Alex, as though she was the one to suggest they go out flying, as though she wanted to endanger Kara. Alex can’t believe it. These people, previously so rational and warm, are now warped and have no grasp of what’s real. She stomps up to their room and doesn’t say a word to Kara until breakfast the next day, when all she manages is a muttered request for Kara to pass the toast.

Alex thinks she’ll get some relief when the next school year starts. With Kara still in eighth grade and Alex starting high school, their worlds will be more separate. She’s bummed that Vicky enrolls in some hippie school closer to the city, but they promise to see each other every Friday night and spend every vacation together. Alex looks forward to Fridays all week, knowing she and Vicky will seal themselves in Vicky’s room to watch scary movies and play with makeup and eat junk food and complain about their little siblings. Kara never asks to join, and Eliza has stopped trying to guilt Alex into inviting her. Alex feels released from her duties as big sister.

And just when things are starting to look up, everything comes crashing down.

Her father is taken away. Because of Kara. Because of this parasite that’s latched onto Alex’s life and drained her of everything that makes her happy.

With her father gone, without anyone to champion her, Alex decides she doesn’t like space anymore. She hates everything to do with the abyss Kara came from. Instead she turns her attention to the minutiae of earthen life forms, excelling in biology and chemistry and physics and every other science class she can fit into her schedule, plus a few extra classes at Midvale Community College. Kara’s no good at science, doesn’t even try to learn anything that won’t be on her tests, and Alex feels like she has one small thing that’s still hers.

Other than that, Vicky is the only thing Alex has that Kara doesn’t. In every way, Vicky is the anti-Kara. She’s cool and critical and doesn’t suffer fools. With Alex’s help, she dies her naturally orangey-red hair a deep burgundy, contrasting her pale skin dramatically. Alex is jealous of it. She wears thick black eyeliner and bright red lipstick and enough foundation to cover her thorough dusting of freckles. Alex loves to watch her transformation in the mornings after she sleeps over; Vicky wakes up clean-faced and bleary-eyed, hair curly and wild, and over the course of forty minutes tames her hair into perfect pinup waves, conceals her freckles, and turns herself into a bombshell. Alex wishes she had the ability to create that intensity. She yearns for it. But she settles for encouraging Vicky, helping her find outfits at local thrift shops she can modify to look like high school versions of her idols: Deeta Von Teese, Betty Page, and Ava Gardner. And while it has the potential to come out looking disastrous, Vicky pulls it off.

Alex thinks Vicky is the coolest girl in the world, and knowing Vicky likes her better than everyone at her hippie school dulls the edge of the anger Alex feels about everything else in her life.

Vicky is the only one Alex can count on to make her feel normal. Vicky doesn’t treat her like some pitiful half-orphan or charity case like everyone else in Alex’s life. She treats her the same as always, and Alex loves her for it. They do the same things they’ve always done, but Alex never has to apologize for crying. One night after Kara accidentally sets Alex’s homework on fire, Alex goes running to Vicky in tears. Vicky prints out a picture of Kara and nails it to the apple tree in her backyard and they take turns throwing fallen apples at it. After Alex hits Kara’s picture smack in the middle, apple juice making the ink run like watercolors down the trunk of the tree, Alex feels a moment of remorse. She knows better than to resort to violence. She starts to cry again, turning into Vicky’s reliable shoulder for comfort. She’s so desperate for someone to be on her side, to see just how awful her life is, she almost tells Vicky Kara’s secret. But she doesn’t. She can’t.

If she did, Vicky might let go.

Upstairs, Vicky brushes Alex’s hair, remarking on how beautiful it is, how shiny and strong and healthy. She braids it and Alex closes her eyes, loving the feel of Vicky’s pale, short fingers with their stubby nails covered in chipped black polish on her scalp. It’s soothing and exhilarating at the same time, tingling all down Alex’s neck, sending goosebumps over her arms. When Vicky finishes, Alex has calmed, and only a few tears slip out as Vicky turns on the TV to watch reruns of  _ Charmed _ like they do most Friday nights.

With Vicky’s help, Alex learns there’s something she can do that Kara can’t. While Kara has gradually learned how to fit in with her peers, Alex has finally learned how to best her own. Halfway through tenth grade, she realizes she’s kind of pretty. Certainly prettier than plain, boring Kara with her mousy brown hair and churchy outfits, who still listens to boy bands and thinks  _ The Notebook _ is the greatest human cinematic achievement since  _ Titanic _ . Alex’s clothes are significantly cooler, her taste in music much better, and her shrewd ability to be both effusive and judgmental has finally landed her in the highest social caste at Midvale High. Alex can manipulate people like puppets, and she often does just for the fun of it and to see Vicky’s proud, conspiratorial smile when she tells her about it later.

Alex has her looks and science and Vicky, and nothing Kara can do will ruin those things.

* * *

Vicky likes to talk about sex. A lot. An eavesdropping stranger would think she’s had a lot of it. But she’s only had sex a handful of times, with just two guys, and Alex really isn’t interested in hearing about it. It sounds kind of gross and awkward, and way too personal a thing to do with a guy at their age. But she doesn’t say any of that, because she’s a virgin, which Vicky likes to point out, and she doesn’t want to seem uncool.

Alex tries to change the subject whenever Vicky brings up sex. It’s a tactic that works whenever Kara starts rambling about something Alex doesn’t care about. Except Vicky is smart, and she gets wise to Alex’s ways.

“Does it gross you out?”

“What? Talking about sex? Pfft,  _ no _ . It’s just private.”

Vicky gives her a judgmental frown.

“Fine, talk about it all you want,” Alex snaps back. “Do you think I should get bangs?”

Alex catches Vicky rolling her eyes.

“What?” Alex asks, already defensive.

“Nothing,” Vicky says, though her tone indicates everything but.

“No, seriously, what?”

Vicky sighs. “You’re  _ so _ vain about your hair.”

“My hair?” Alex asks, frowning as though she doesn’t know what Vicky’s talking about.

But she knows.

Alex clings to her hair. It’s the one thing about her that feels naturally superior to Kara. Her hair is long and shiny and healthy, and while Kara’s is all those things, not to mention blonde, Alex’s hair is just a little more beautiful. Alex’s hair defines her as indisputably feminine, and even though it feels silly, she needs that. Especially when she sees her classmates rolling their eyes at her and muttering that she’s a know-it-all and show-off.

“Don’t play dumb,” Vicky says, rolling her eyes. “I hate when you do that.”

“I’m not playing dumb!” Alex protests a bit too dramatically. “You think I’m vain about my hair?”

“Alex…” 

“What?”

“Stop it!”

“Stop  _ what _ ?”

Vicky snaps. “You know what? Find someone else to see  _ Mr. and Mrs. Smith _ with tomorrow.”

“Wait... seriously?”

Vicky doesn’t look at her, leaning into the mirror to reapply her lipstick. “I was gonna see it with Andrew tonight anyway.”

That hits Alex like a dagger to the chest. Sharing Vicky with boys on the weekends is okay as long as they don’t encroach on Alex’s time with her. But their time is sacred.

“Vee…” Alex says, aghast.

“It’s just a movie, Alex,” Vicky says bitterly. “I can’t hold your hand all the time.”

Alex reels back, stunned, feeling like she doesn’t know this girl she slept next to last night.

So she decides to play cold until Vicky comes to her senses and apologizes. Which lasts about two days, because by the end of the weekend Alex is tearing her hair out listening to Kara laughing and talking her best friend Simon. She’s glad Kara has someone to spend time with so she’s not in Alex’s hair all the time, but Simon is… well, there isn’t any way to explain it other than to say that Simon is so flamboyantly gay Alex is embarrassed for him. His demeanor seems so contrived and effortful, like every flick of his wrist and upturned, dramatic “ _ Girl…” _ is cultivated for attention. She hates when Kara invites him over and hates even more when Kara tries to get Alex to hang out with them. 

So she caves and calls Vicky, asking if she can come over and vent, and Vicky replies with a cool, casual, “Sure.”

She arrives with a two liter of Coke and a water bottle with a few shots of Jack Daniels she’s been pilfering from the bottle in the cabinet, untouched except by her since her dad left. She thinks of him every time she pours a bit out of the bottle, replacing it with water, wondering if it even matters. Eliza is so engulfed in work and grief she doesn’t notice either of her daughters much anymore. 

Vicky gives her an impatient smile and mixes the drinks. She turns on the TV to reruns of  _ Charmed _ and plops down on a beanbag. Alex would feel ignored if this weren’t a typical night for them.

“Kara’s friend Simon is the bane of my existence,” Alex says dramatically after her first sip of the Jack-heavy drink. 

“Why?” Vicky says, frowning into her cup.

“He’s just so annoying. Everything is so dramatic with him.”

Vicky raises her manicured eyebrows and takes a big drink. Alex sees judgment all over her face.

“You don’t think he’s annoying?”

Vicky shrugs. “I’ve only met him a few times, but he seemed fine.”

Alex sits down, frowning at Vicky while Vicky looks determinedly at the TV.

“Why aren’t you on my side here?” Alex whines.

“Cuz it’s obvious you just don’t like him ‘cuz he’s gay, and that’s not cool.”

“ _ What _ ?” Alex gasps. She can’t believe Vicky is accusing her of not liking Simon because he’s gay. “I don’t have a problem with him being  _ gay _ . I just don’t think he’s a good influence on my sister.”

“What, and you are?” Vicky asks pointedly, nodding toward the empty water bottle with a few golden drops of whiskey in the bottom.

“No, I just-“ Alex closes her eyes, frustrated. “Why can’t you just let me vent?”

Vicky sighs and slides down in her beanbag, muttering, “Because lately that’s all you wanna do.”

Alex gapes at her, affronted, but Vicky pretends not to see, pretending the episode where Prue dies isn’t one they’ve seen four times already.

If she’s honest, Alex hates this show. She doesn’t need to spend any more of her time watching girls with superhuman powers do superhuman things. She gets enough of that at home, whenever Kara’s feeling mischievous and decides to make toast “the fun way,” or turn the backyard into an ice skating rink. But Vicky loves  _ Charmed _ , so they’ve seen every season at least twice.

“I can’t believe they wrote Prue off the show,” Vicky mutters. “Stupid.”

Alex looks at her. She takes in her perky burgundy ponytail and her manicured bangs. She looks at her eyeliner and pasty foundation and thinks, for the first time, that maybe Vicky is wrong about some things. Lately she’s been selfish and boy crazy and not at all concerned about what Alex is feeling. They never even talked about Alex’s dad since he disappeared three years ago. At the time it was nice because it felt like every other person on earth wanted to talk to her about it: her mom, her teachers, Kara, the school counselor. But now it makes Vicky seem callous and icy, and makes Alex mad.

“I can,” she says.

“What?”

“I can believe they wrote Prue off. What I can’t believe is how much you like this stupid show.” 

“Alex, this is our show.”

“Now, it’s  _ your _ show. You just never bothered to ask what I wanted to watch and I just went along with it because  _ that’s what we always do _ .”

“Alex, what the fuck?” Vicky says, sitting up and turning to Alex.

“I’m tired of it!” Alex says. “If you wanna watch your shitty show and pretend I don’t have problems and feelings, go ahead, but I have other friends I can hang out with. Unlike you.”

Vicky flips her hand up, annoyed. “Alex,  _ all we do _ is talk about your problems and feelings. Like last week when you were upset because Kara keeps borrowing your makeup without asking even though you do the same to her all the time, and the week before that when you heard that your chemistry teacher is retiring at the end of the year, and the week before that when your mom did something you were certain meant she loves Kara more than you, Kara did this and Kara did that and about five hundred other things exactly like that.”

Alex is livid. She can’t believe Vicky is throwing all this in her face right when she specifically came over to vent. She slams her half-full cup of Jack and Coke on the TV stand and towers over Vicky. “You know what? Fine. You don’t have to listen to me complain anymore. Have fun fucking the whole football team at your school. I’m gonna spend my time making sure I get into college so I can make something of myself instead of whoring myself out to any guy who looks at me.”

Alex grabs her bag and stomps down the stairs, but not before Vicky shouts, “ _ At least I’m not a self-obsessed, know-it-all virgin! _ ”

Alex doesn’t even bother to say goodbye to Mrs. Donahue as she slams the front door and digs for her keys, dropping them twice before she unlocks her car and starts the engine. She barely makes it down the block before she’s crying, hot, angry, noisy sobs, and she has to pull over to cry for a while before she can pull herself together to make it home.

Up in their room, Simon is gone, and Kara flutters anxiously around Alex when she realizes something’s wrong. She prods and pokes at Alex, and if Alex weren’t so upset, she might snap at her. Instead she just cries silently and lets Kara dote on her, feeling like Kara owes it to her after all she’s done to ruin Alex’s life.

“Alex, whatever happened, I’m sure it’s gonna be okay. You and Vicky are best friends. Best friends always work things out.”

Alex gulps and doesn’t reply to Kara’s absurd optimism, wondering if she can ever come back from what she said to Vicky.

Kara pouts and tries to comfort her, bringing her cocoa and a cookie and offering to watch  _ Scream _ with her even though Kara hates it. Alex just shakes her head and lets a few final exhausted tears leak out of her eyes.

Kara catches her tears, that look of pained sympathy on her sweet, innocent face, and Alex both hates and loves her for being there. 

Alex takes a breath, leaning into Kara for the first time. 

“I don’t know what to do,” she mumbles.

“The best with what you’ve got,” Kara says. “And you’ve got a lot, Alex.”

Alex is surprised to hear Kara say such a thing. 

“You do,” Kara assures her. “You’re the smartest person I know. And I know a lot of smart people. Plus you’re pretty and popular and ambitious. You’re gonna be more than okay.”

Alex exhales, feeling an unexpected relief wash over her. Kara is the last person she expected to comfort her. But it’s nice.

* * *

The next day Alex decides to be satisfied with her life without Vicky out of spite. She’s careful to acknowledge everyone in her friend group at lunch, asking about their weekends, apologizing for missing one kid’s band gig at a roller rink an hour out of town. She volunteers to help the Prom committee, and in doing so, secures a date with the basketball team’s point guard. He’s pretty, but dumb. But it’s okay because all Alex cares about is that she can wear heels and not tower over him in their photos. She kisses him on the dance floor because she can, and because the whistles and comments of her classmates make her feel like she’s achieved something more nebulous and rare than a science fair ribbon or spot on the honor roll.

Vicky doesn’t call or message her on AIM, and after weeks of nothing, Alex knows it’s over. They’re not friends anymore. The heartbreak comes in fits and waves, triggered by a long burgundy hair found in her hairbrush, a ticket stub fallen behind her dresser, a bottle cap on the counter at a party. Alex hates herself for losing her cool, hates herself for being so needy, hates herself for letting one person have so much of her. And she hates that by now, no apology will be enough.

Kara’s the only one who knows how sad she is, but she’s smart enough not to say anything. Instead they watch movies and eat whole boxes of pastries together, slowly building up some sort of sisterly bond. Alex is cautious about it, because Kara is still an alien and still the girl who took everything from her. But Kara owes her, and Kara would never say the awful things Vicky said to her.

She can’t shake off one thing Vicky said, though. That she’s a virgin. There isn’t anyone she’s interested in having sex with, but she hates being thought of as frigid. She wants to understand what the big deal is. 

The first time Alex touches herself, it’s a calculation. It’s not so much about the pleasure of it, though she’s intrigued by that. It’s about the probability that something so basic could occupy so much of the mental energy of the rest of the population.

And it isn’t bad. She understands objectively why people enjoy it. But it’s also a lot of work, a lot of negotiating with herself for anything to actually happen. She isn’t sure what she’s supposed to focus on: technique? Sensation? Result? She has a hard time concentrating, mind drifting to her upcoming AP Bio and Chemistry exams. She wonders what most people think of when they touch themselves, and briefly tries to imagine someone else there with her. But that has the opposite effect on her, so she just goes back to observing how her body reacts to certain touches.

In the end, she’s unimpressed and uninspired. She washes her hands and goes back to her homework, slightly more alert and a little distracted by her own stickiness. She tries it again a few times when she needs to blow off steam and can’t sneak a drink or go for a jog. But it doesn’t inspire her, and she certainly doesn’t want to do it with other people.

* * *

Alex graduates at the top of her class, giving her valedictorian speech to a standing ovation that almost chokes her up. She’s felt insignificant for so long, and here are hundreds of people applauding her, telling her she is good enough and smart enough and will go on to do great things now that she’s not confined to Midvale. Her teachers, her classmates, her mother and sister are all beaming at her, and for a moment she thinks she really deserves her acceptance to Stanford.

But the face she wishes was in the crowd most, the face that would render all the thunderous applause mute, isn’t there. And she knows she should feel terrible that it isn’t her father whose approval would mean the most to her. But it isn’t.

It’s Vicky, with her burgundy hair and sharp eyeliner and fire engine red lips. And she’s not there.

All Alex can hope is that someday she won’t miss her anymore.


	2. Second Chances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> College and med school Alex being a hot, lovable mess.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warnings: brief consensual but unenjoyed het sex, drugs, alcohol abuse
> 
> Be sure to check out Maggie's story "Cliffjumper" where there's some slightly better sex and less drugs & alcohol.
> 
> Thanks to my beta @youreterriblemuriel
> 
> Follow me on Tumblr @lingeringlilies

Stanford is everything Alex hoped it would be. It’s big and pulsing with intelligent thought, minds spinning as fast as hers. She no longer has to dumb down her vocabulary or pretend not to be interested in science to make friends. She’s surrounded by people who can keep up, which only makes her spin faster. She was a big fish in a small pond, but now she’s in the ocean and laughs at how trivial everything in Midvale seems now.

She aces all her classes, but it’s work. She actually has to study, and she’s mildly upset when she gets her first B on a research paper. But she commits herself even more devotedly to her favorite hutch in the library, and recovers.

She’s been so single-mindedly focused on her studies, she hasn’t gotten to know her classmates or the people on her hall. Things are finally good with her and Kara, and they talk all the time, but it’s nice to be far away. As much as she appreciates her sister, she’s glad to be free from the weight of keeping such a big secret from her friends. 

If she had any friends.

Whenever she sees groups of students going off campus to see a movie or eat dinner, she feels secretly superior that she doesn’t waste time with such things. Who knows what her grades would look like if she took a night off studying. She doesn’t want to waste a minute.

That is, until she meets Brian Dalay.

She’s eating alone in the dining hall closest to her dorm reading a recently published article on biocatalysts by a team of researchers at Duke. She’s squinting at it, noting the design flaws in the study, when Brian slides his tray across from hers. 

“Mind if I sit here?”

Alex looks up to say that actually she does mind if he sits there, but then recognizes him as the TA from her Biology 306 lecture. 

She shrugs and lets him sit, and he starts talking.

Since arriving at Stanford, Alex has only really had regular conversations with Kara and her mother and a few professors. It feels like a muscle she’s forgotten how to use; she finds herself spinning into long, rambling responses to his most basic questions, forgetting to ask him anything about himself. But he takes it in stride, smiling at her in a way that doesn’t make her feel gross, and before Alex knows it the dining hall is closing until dinner. Brian offers to take her tray up to the counter and then walks with her out into the late fall air, saying goodbye as she departs for the library. 

The next week he seeks her out in the same spot. Alex is prepared this time, and when he asks if he can sit, she gives him a nod and a small smile. He’s brought an article he mentioned about hermeneutics, which had come up when Alex complained about her requisite philosophy class, and Alex is taken aback by his thoughtfulness. It’s the kind of thing her father would have done for her, or one of her favorite teachers in high school. But Brian has no obligation to her, so the gesture confuses her for a minute.

They start studying together, and Alex is flattered by the way Brian listens to her and asks questions. He smiles an awful lot, and it’s often a distraction from whatever they’re working on. She takes on the role of taskmaster so they don’t waste any precious study time. He goes back to his books, but one day, a few minutes after being redirected, he looks up.

“Would you have dinner with me on Saturday night?”

Alex is confused for a moment, wondering why he wants to make sure he has someone to sit with in the dining hall on the least crowded night of the week. Then she realizes he’s asking her on a date.

She’s never been on one of those. Not a real date. Going to Prom with the Midvale High point guard doesn’t count as a date. 

Caught off guard, she stumbles for a moment before she gives a tentative nod. She’s not sure why he wants to go out with her, but he can talk about bacterial fission or solar particles for hours. Alex always imagined dating someone who could keep up with her. Plus she doesn’t hate looking at him. He’s pretty cute. She’s pretty sure Kara would approve if she saw a picture of him. 

He smiles, satisfied, and looks back down at his book. Alex can tell he’s not really studying, and she almost rolls her eyes at how smug he looks, like he tricked her into going out with him. But it’s flattering. 

When he leaves twenty minutes later, rapping the table with his knuckles as he smiles and says he’ll wait outside her dorm at 7:00, Alex smiles back.

Dating is the next frontier for her, she hopes. High school boys were stupid and close-minded. But Brian is smart and older than her, and perhaps he’ll be able to bring out the side of her that the boys of Midvale couldn’t.

Because deep down, she desperately wants there to be a romantic side to her. Vicky’s accusation that she’s a self-obsessed, know-it-all virgin still haunts the back of her mind, and she wants to know she’s capable of more than just data and formulas. She wants to understand the appeal of all the ridiculous movies Kara always wants to watch, wants to know why people wrote poetry for centuries before they got their act together and realized the earth wasn’t flat.

There has to be a reason art and music and poetry herald Love as the highest human function. She understands cells and kinesthetics and particle formation, but she doesn’t understand this thing everyone else seems hopped up on.

Brian takes her to a restaurant and then to see  _ The Illusionist _ . It isn’t something Alex would have chosen herself - she would rather have gone to see  _ Casino Royale _ \- but it’s interesting. On the drive back to campus she thinks about illusionists and how they can make something seem real even though it isn’t.

When he pulls up in front of her dorm she starts to feel weird. She hasn’t really thought about this part. Obviously the date has to end, but she feels pressure to say or do something to cap it.

But she looks over at Brian and sees him leaning against the door in his easy way, grinning at her, and for the first time she sees herself in the role of Girl on a date with a Boy. She’s achieved something. So rather than wait for him to make a move or ask her out again, she lets go of the door handle and leans across to him, cupping his face as she kisses him.

It’s brief and lacking in softness or warmth, but it’s still a kiss. It’s a star at the top of a perfect quiz handed back to her. She shifts back, heart racing with the rush of her own boldness, and gives a half-smile.

Something seems to shift in Brian. He follows her back over to her seat, hovering over her face, then brings his mouth to hers. It isn’t aggressive, but it’s not exactly soft. Alex wonders if he’s been planning this since that first day he set his tray down across from hers. Perhaps their date isn’t an achievement for her; perhaps she’s the thing being achieved.

But she’s still in the role of Girl dating Boy, so she lets him kiss her for a while. She feels his tongue slip over her lips and her eyebrows start shifting up as she searches out the good feeling, the reason why people like this. It’s not that she doesn’t. It’s just that it’s strange. She’ll get used to it, she’s sure. There are a lot of weird feelings she’s gotten used to. Like having an alien for a sister.

After their date, Alex and Brian still study together a few times a week. Alex is vigilant about staying focused. She’s only going to work on the smoke and mirrors and romance stuff on the weekends. Most of the time she’s Alex Danvers, biology and pre-med student, but on Saturday nights she’s Alex Danvers, illusionist in training.

She realizes she’s got Brian spellbound when he calls her his girlfriend a few weeks later. She’s flattered and proud, like she’s reached a certain level of mastery. It’s easier than she expects, though she doesn’t especially look forward to their dates. She doesn’t dread them either. They’re just a part of her week, like the calculus quiz she always aces, and her weekly phone call home to her mother and Kara, or her trips to the grocery store to buy more Easy Mac and salted peanuts for late nights spent studying.

Mostly, it’s an opportunity for her to be good at something.

Brian is nice to her, flattering and polite. But Alex senses a hunger he’s trying to keep down, a desire for more than the grace of her presence every weekend. She knows what that hunger is. She inches toward it each time  she tolerates new touches and deeper makeout sessions.

But she knows at some point she’ll have to decide whether she’s going to have sex or break up with him. Even if Brian has given no concrete indication of impatience, Alex feels it. Or maybe Alex just thinks she does because that’s what boys and girls do in college, and she so desperately wants to be like all the other students in her classes, who she is certain are having mind-blowing sex at every opportunity. 

There’s a progression of hands in places Alex isn’t sure about. Some of it feels good. She likes when Brian holds her around the waist, makes her feel feminine and beautiful and desired. And it doesn’t feel bad to kiss him or even let him grope under her shirt. But the thought of taking off her pants or taking off his is unappealing. 

It’s probably nerves, she thinks, and once she’s done it she’ll understand why people like it. It could be a whole universe she doesn’t understand yet.

So she lets him unbutton her pants and slip his fingers inside her, rubbing and scratching at her as though trying to unlock something. There’s a surge of some sort, but it’s not all good. She feels obligated to enjoy it, so she lets out a few little noises that probably don’t sound as aroused as she intended. But he seems to buy it, and after a while - too long - he stops, seemingly for no reason, with a satisfied, almost smug smile on his face.

“That was so hot,” he mumbles.

Alex gives a nervous, breathy laugh in a response, and wonders if he thinks she actually came. 

She buttons her pants and thanks him, though she’s not sure for what, and goes back to her dorm.

He’s less fun to study with after that. He’s always trying to distract her, always making comments that feel inappropriate for the library. She feels like all he ever thinks about is sex. And even though he never says anything to indicate it, she feels like she’s disappointing him.

And if there’s one thing Alex can’t stand, it’s feeling like she’s disappointing someone she cares about.

Relief comes in the form of the first and only C Alex receives in her life. It’s horrifying and unacceptable, and Alex knows immediately what she has to do. She’s clear with Brian, explaining that she’s here to succeed and get into med school, and that she has plenty of time for boys once she’s finished her residency. He looks surprised and more hurt than anything else, and Alex falters for a moment, wondering if she’s doing the right thing. He gives her a dejected hug and a kiss on the cheek and slinks back to his dorm.

Alex drags herself up the stairs of her own dorm, closes her door, and bursts into tears. 

She feels like she failed, like she let a good guy down just because she doesn’t feel things. She feels stupid and thinks maybe Vicky was right, that she’s a frigid, self-obsessed know-it-all. 

She cries harder than she expected to, and after realizing she’s wasted an hour of precious study time, calls Kara to help boost her spirits.

Kara, of course, never lets her down.

“It sounds like you did the right thing,” Kara says sweetly. “You shouldn’t be with someone you’re not excited about.”

Alex swallows and agrees, then wonders why her initial excitement about him faded.

Alex is surprised when that excitement happens again so quickly. There’s a guy in her physics lab, a mechanical engineering student who makes her laugh. They go out a few times, and Alex is more comfortable making out with him. But when he invites her back to his place for a drink one night, she retreats, certain it won’t be worth her time.

Despite justifying their breakup to Brian saying she needs to focus on her studies, Alex keeps dating. It’s a sport for her. In lieu of a group of friends, the attention and flattery of men are just what her ego needs.

But she soon discovers that most of them are no different than Rick Treewater. They’re nerds who grew into their looks after high school with barely enough emotional intelligence to fill a petri dish. They try to charm her with talk of saving the world, of developing a vaccine to cure Alzheimer's or diabetes or male pattern baldness.

Alex tires of one after another, and by senior year she swears off dating, throwing her whole self into studying for the MCAT.

* * *

Even though she’s still on the same campus, med school is a completely different environment than undergrad. It’s cutthroat and competitive, and this time she’s not creating those illusions in her mind. The sink-or-swim mentality starts to dig into her, and she’s constantly stressed.

While her lack of social engagement during undergrad felt like a choice, in med school it feels like an inevitability. She studies and eats and if she’s lucky, she sleeps in weird shifts and bursts.

There’s a guy in Alex’s cohort that seems to hang around her more than he needs to. At first Alex ignores Elliot Pitzer because she's too busy. But they have all their classes together, and she can tell his interest in her is genuine. He’s not bullshitting anything or trying to score. He’s smart and reserved and level-headed and Alex appreciates his steady presence.

They start dating, if Alex can call it that. They eat in the dining hall and take turns quizzing each other for microbio and pathology. Before long people know they’re a couple, and Alex feels like sex isn’t something she can put off anymore. Elliot isn’t a terrible person. He’s smart and attractive and probably won’t tell their classmates about it.

Alex sets up the scene. She lights candles in her crappy little grad school apartment, then blows them out, realizing guys don’t care about that stuff. She pours them a glass of wine, and after they make out a bit, she takes her shirt off, revealing a black satin bra with the little pink rosette between the cups. Elliot looks at her in surprise as she stands and slips off her skirt, revealing matching panties.

She drags him by the collar into the bedroom with a heaviness she can’t place. She’s supposed to be excited, and on some level she is. Scared, too, but Elliot is a good man. He’ll be gentle with her.

And he is. But Alex feels like she’s all angles and weak spots and once he’s inside her she has the sensation of having to hold her breath and wait for some kind of relief. She doesn’t like the feeling of being under him, small and disengaged aside from where they’re connected. But the thought of being on top, having to control the pace and movement doesn’t sound good either. So she endures, and she assures him that she’s fine, and she waits for it to be over. It doesn’t even occur to her to fake anything. Afterwards she lays there, stiff and confused, wondering how to get him out of her apartment so she can shower and sleep. She lays there for a long time, then bolts upright, pretending to have just remembered something. 

“Shit, I just remembered I didn’t go over my notes for Infectious Diseases tomorrow morning.”

Elliot blinks up at her for a moment, then asked groggily. “Okay… did you want me to quiz you?”

“No… no, I’ll just go do that now.” 

She pulls on a shirt and running shorts and goes into the living room, taking out the notes she’s already read over three times, hoping he’ll get the hint. He does, kissing her on the cheek as he leaves. With it, he places a weighty medallion of guilt around her neck. He’s a good guy, and Alex doesn’t want to make him feel bad, but she really wants to sleep alone. 

Alex realizes with a sinking feeling that once they’ve done it, the floodgates are open. Elliot wants to have sex all the time, and Alex finds herself getting annoyed with him at the first hint he wants to undress her. Even his lips on the curve of her neck, or the touch of his hand on her hip put her on edge. 

He’s still romantic and kind to her. He takes her to nice restaurants and sends “Thinking of you” texts. Alex senses he’s getting desperate when he starts reading her poetry. Rumi and Neruda and Whitman. She listens patiently, wondering if this nonsense works on other girls to get them in the mood. One day when he brings her a poem he wrote himself, Alex feels a wall come crashing down between them. They have no chemistry, nothing in common except their classes and their active lifestyle. Alex knows those aren’t good enough reasons to be with someone. Especially at their age.

She’s a little cold in how she breaks it off. Her words are too clipped, her shoulders stiff. She isn’t able to convey how much she appreciates him, how he’s been patient with her and tried to make things work. But she’s tired of feeling guilty, tired of feeling not good enough, tired from lack of sleep and lack of joy. Without the obligation he brings to her life, maybe she’ll finally feel rested.

And she does rest. Quite literally. That afternoon she sleeps for five uninterrupted hours. When she wakes, she’s alert and motivated and hardly feels out of breath after a three mile run. 

Her head is clear and cool for a few weeks after that. She’s focused and intentional as she drafts a research proposal for her third year. 

But there’s also a hardness, a steely determination not to get distracted or put herself in another shitty situation again. She distances herself from everyone, including her mother and Kara. She calls them every week or two, but she doesn’t tell them much. Mostly she listens to their problems, which seem petty and insignificant compared to what she’s undertaking. Her classmates become irritating, and she starts to resent everything and everyone around her.

She goes home for a week between her second and third year. She’s been looking forward to it for months, thinking of all the good food and sleep she’ll get and all the time she’ll get to spend with Kara. 

But her trip home does nothing to relax her. Kara is taking classes at Midvale Community College and waitressing at a diner, which Eliza seems to think is the greatest achievement since the completion of the Human Genome Project. Alex knows it can’t be easy for Kara, with all the noise and people and smells and her constant vigilance about controlling her powers. But Eliza seems to think Kara’s work surpasses everything Alex is doing. She barely asks Alex how school is going, praising Kara constantly as though she’s some fragile little girl who isn’t impervious to bullets.

Alex would never admit it, but she feels more fragile than anyone.

She sleeps as much as she can and spends the week binge-watching  _ Homeland _ before going back to campus, resentful and eager to throw herself into her research. 

Alex has been wary of befriending girls since she and Vicky fell out. They always seem to screw her over in some way. Men are easy; their deception is usually on the surface. But girls are tricky, their cunning ways sly and thin like butterfly knives meant to slide through Alex’s skin when she least expects it.

When she does have to be around women - professors, classmates, students in the seminar she had to teach - she affords them no special privileges. She rolls her eyes whenever a classmate or professor makes a comment about women having to support each other, especially in the sciences. Alex is successful in the sciences, and no woman helped her get there. She’s clawed her way up herself, and she isn’t going to share the credit or offer any pats on the back to others who manage to keep up.

But there’s one girl in her cohort Alex doesn’t mind: Natalie. She’s smart as a whip, and while she can’t keep up with Alex on the track, she’s interested in Alex’s research and always up for talking about her own. Not completely candidly - they have to protect their intellectual property - but if there’s anyone Alex thinks won’t screw her over, it’s Natalie. Perhaps because Natalie seems to care so little about things, to the point where it almost infuriates Alex. But she knows Natalie is smart, and she knows she’s doing well. She’s just cool and relaxed in a way that makes Alex almost jealous.

One night, when Alex is bleary-eyed and feeling almost drunk from deprivation of sleep and sunlight, she has a moment of weakness and asks Natalie what her secret is.

“How are you not a total wreck like the rest of us?

Natalie smirks. “You really want to know?”

Alex gives a tentative nod.

“Well, I do kickboxing. That keeps me grounded. But also…”

From somewhere in her bag, Natalie produces an Altoid tin, from which she withdraws a little bag in which Alex can see a joint. 

Alex almost laughs, but when Natalie holds it up and says, “Want some?” Alex finds herself nodding. She is so stressed out, so desperate for relief from the nonstop pressure of working on her research, she would have said yes to almost anything. Maybe not heroin or meth, but anything else.

They go outside the lab and Natalie lights up, handing it to Alex after she takes a hit. Natalie must be able to tell Alex hasn’t done this before, because she laughs as she exhales a cloud of smoke and reaches over to show Alex how to hold it, instructing her to inhale and hold her breath for as long as she can. It burns and Alex feels her eyes dry out, and she can only hold her breath for a few seconds before she starts coughing uncontrollably, at which Natalie laughs and holds a finger up, telling her not to draw attention to what they’re doing. She pats Alex on the shoulder and squeezes her arm, and Alex feels a sudden lightness, a release of tension in her whole body as her mind goes soft and calm.

“Doing ok?” Natalie grins.

Alex sputters some more but nods, leaning against the building, head tilting back.

She feels good, like she expected her week home with her mom and Kara to make her feel.

“You should come to kickboxing with me,” Natalie says after she takes another hit. “I think you’d like it.”

Alex feels something swirling through her, and as she takes another hit, inhaling less deeply this time, she struck by how cool Natalie is. Not cool in a popular way. It's a coolness from the core, a state of absolute control and relaxation, even when deadlines approach and research proposals are handed back with red marks all over them. The coolness doesn't seep over into being lazy or dispassionate. Natalie is simply calm and focused. There's none of the crazy spinning Alex always feels. She gets the impression that Natalie is in med school because it genuinely interests her and she likes learning and helping people. She’s so easygoing and flexible, she probably wouldn’t even blink if being a doctor didn’t work out. 

Alex is pretty sure if being a doctor didn’t work out, she’d die. 

After that, Alex starts hanging out with Natalie a lot. They study and go to kickboxing together, which Alex finds settles her mind and body almost as well as the joint they split on Friday nights, laying on the carpet of Natalie’s apartment staring at the ceiling talking about everything and nothing. Alex forgot how nice friendship is, how much comfort she takes in relating to other women. Maybe her professors and classmates have a point about women supporting other women. She would certainly support Natalie, if Natalie ever needed it. 

And then, completely unexpectedly, Natalie drops out. She’s gone, packed up and moved back to Boston to stay with her parents and figure stuff out for a while. Alex wonders what happened, if she lost her passion for medicine or had some invisible breakdown or what. Natalie seemed so solid. It doesn’t make sense. 

Alex is lonely again, and no kickboxing class or dinner with her classmates can change that. She wants to call Natalie, to ask her what happened, but they didn’t have that kind of friendship. It would seem too needy to call her up and ask for an explanation. 

Alex feels pressure unlike any she’s experienced before. She’s struggling to finish and present her research, her papers are piling up, and the looming reality of clinical rotations and residency creates a pressure cooker she’s not sure she’ll survive. Alex feels lost. She tries a spin class but it only frustrates her. She can’t spin fast enough, can’t find the right resistance, and above everything else, she’s literally not getting anywhere. She misses Natalie more than she expects to, wishing she could have just five minutes of lying on her floor stoned. She asks around and eventually scores a joint, which she takes a few hits off of in her bathroom.

She feels it hit her. Kind of. It’s not the same. She feels scratchier and more unsteady, like the floor is warping and she’s tipping toward it. She waits for a few minutes to see if the good feeling kicks in, but it doesn’t. 

She’s not sure if she just got some that was too old or too mild, but she doesn’t feel the same floating, warm feeling she felt with Natalie. She stubs it out after a few hits, tucking it into a tin behind her silverware drawer, and decides to go out instead. She texts some people in her cohort to see if there’s anything going on that night, and they seem pleasantly surprised and willing to include her. She puts on a form-fitting dress Kara got her for her birthday a few years ago, takes off the tag, and straps on a pair of heels she’d kept mostly for the irony of it. Wavering even before her first drink, she flings herself into the night, hoping to feel the same high she felt flying with Kara or smoking with Natalie.

Her classmates are encouraging, buying her all the drinks she wants and dancing with her, asking where “Fun Alex” has been all these years. She keeps her distance from the guys -- she doesn’t want a repeat of Brian or Elliot or any of the others she wasted her time on -- and loses herself in the heavy bass, so loud it vibrates her teeth in their sockets. Her mind is stilled and she can just be, just feel; the slurry of sounds and lights and colors is soothing.

Nothing matters. Not med school or Natalie being gone or her dad dying or the fact that her sister is an alien.

She stumbles home as the sun is rising, knowing she’ll go out again the following weekend.

And she does, spending her whole week looking forward to the beat and the soothing haze alcohol affords her. She finds every opportunity to go out and celebrate - every passed test, every paper turned in, every lab report filed. Saturday nights blend with Friday nights, and then Thursday nights, until Alex almost doesn’t know what day it is. Med school is something she does sometimes, and in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t really matter. She even finds herself drunkenly confessing to a stranger one night that she hates it.

She’s vibrating at a speed almost faster than light, and she doesn’t know when it will stop. She doesn’t want it to stop. Even when her grades slip, even when she fails a test, even when she’s put on academic probation. She hides it all from her classmates, who seem in awe that she’s able to go so hard in every direction of her life. To them, she’s a machine fueled by tequila and pressure.

It’s not so easy to fool her mother. She doesn’t know how Eliza knows, but she starts calling Alex more frequently. After Alex answers drunk one time, Eliza starts checking up on her constantly, asking if she needs to come home and rest for a week, if maybe she should see someone about the stress getting to her. Alex rejects the idea outright, offended that her mom thinks she has some sort of psychological problem, and stops taking her calls. She feels like a disappointment, like she can never redeem her mother’s admiration, so she doesn’t bother trying. As long as she can show up to class and not fail out, she sees no reason to stop.

Except eventually she does stop. Or rather, someone stops her.

The night gets away from her. She has one too many - or three too many - five? - and she stumbles out of the club, not knowing where her friends are, or if she even came with them tonight, or what night it is. In her addled, intoxicated state, she fishes out her keys, dropping them. She trips over her heels as she struggles to pick up her keys, then reaches for her car door handle.

She’ll be fine. It’s only a few miles back to campus. She’ll go home and sleep it off and in the morning she’ll work on that research thing she was supposed to turn in last week. 

The cops seem to have other plans for her.

She finds herself in a jail cell, and the roaring ride of the past year comes to screeching halt. She sees all the scattered shards of her life on the cement floor, feels the deception and shame heavy in her gut, the unmanageability of her life throbbing in her skull.

She’s fucked herself over, and people are starting to see.

She isn’t sure what to make of Hank Henshaw when he approaches her. He looks like a preacher or lawyer or some other stiff-collared do-gooder, which makes Alex feel like even more of a disaster. She’s a medical student, not a charity case or soul to be rescued. She regards him with heavy skepticism and concern. 

She’s stunned to learn how much he knows about her. She feels naked and even more disoriented. He knows about Kara and Vicky and Brian and Elliot and seems to have read every paper she’s written in the last ten years. Her hackles raise - subdued only a little by the alcohol - but nothing he does or says is belittling or malevolent. 

And then he offers her a way out - a way out of her degree, out of her chaos, out of her unhappiness. The terms are strict. Stricter than any moral or ethical code she’s ever subscribed to. But after heavy, sober reflection, she sees it for what it really is: a lifeline.

And what a lifeline it is.


	3. The DEO

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So this chapter skips over a lot of what happened in season 1. Not because it’s not important, but because you can watch the show for that. (And I’m sure more than a few readers skipped that season because it’s not gay enough. Also, I didn’t want to write Trashwell Lord because as far as I’m concerned he can eat hot magma.) So rest assured that everything in canon season 1 happens in this story, it just probably isn’t mentioned because it doesn’t directly lead up to Alex meeting Maggie.

For the first time in her life, Alex is challenged. Really, truly challenged. Every cell in her body feels fragile and unsure. Can she endure this? Bruises rise where she took hits poorly. Circles form under her eyes. She’s bone-tired and sleep-deprived.

But she’s more alive than she’s ever felt. She thrives on the structure and discipline. She’s always been disciplined, but when it’s part of a greater effort, a cause bigger than herself, it’s effortless to maintain. She gets the urge to drink sometimes, but she’s so bone tired and hungry, it doesn’t take much effort to abstain. Hank had said they’d get her into a program if she needed it, but she seems to be doing okay.

She trains twelve hours a day, enduring the most grueling mental and physical workouts imaginable. She’s briefed on current threats, tracking programs, and learns how to use all the equipment in the lab. She learns to admit when she doesn’t know something rather than fail and inconvenience or endanger a colleague. 

After only a few weeks, she cuts her hair. There is no space for pride or vanity in the DEO. Her superficial concern with her femininity and how she looks is childish and only causes her grief. She doesn’t need to feel feminine. She needs to feel effective and powerful, and no vanity is going to get in the way of that.

For the first time, Alex has no idea if what she’s doing is good enough. In the past she’s always known she was doing well because she had transcripts and trophies and awards, but there are none of those things at the DEO. There are only her biweekly evaluations with Hank, which focus on her areas for improvement. She thought Stanford had taught her all the critical thinking and effective decision-making she would need, but apparently there are people who devote their lives to developing systems and mathematical equations for making decisions. She learns them, adding them to her arsenal of knowledge and mental abilities.

Then there’s the matter of weapons. Alex has never held a gun - why would she need to in boring Midvale or on Stanford’s campus? - and just walking into the weapons room gives her anxiety. They aren’t just normal guns either. Some of them could wipe out city blocks or take down someone as supposedly impervious as Kara. But she pushes herself, because using weapons is part of her job now.

She thinks about Kara more often than ever. People at the DEO know she grew up with a Kryptonian and ask her about it sometimes. It’s weird, talking to other people about the  _ real _ Kara. For ten years she’s kept her sister’s secret in a vault, and now she doesn’t have to. 

Ironically, now that she can talk about Kara - really  _ talk _ about Kara beyond the typical sisterly annoyances - she finds she doesn’t want to. She wants to know she earned her job on her own merits, not her proximity to an alien. She doesn’t even want to talk  _ to _ Kara. She might let her own secret slip now, that she’s working for the DEO and not some benign lab. So she continues with the trend she started when she started partying, ignoring her mother and sister’s calls, assuring them she’s fine, better than fine, and that things are going  _ great _ .

She doesn’t exactly tell them she’s dropped out. She tells them she got hired by a genetic engineering lab and is taking a break to make sure med school is really what she wants. Her mother is more than a little concerned and asks a lot of questions about Alex’s new job. But Alex deflects and assures her mom she’s fine and she’s sobered up and has never felt better. Which is true, in most ways. She’s stopped drinking and though her body is constantly aching and sore and fatigued, her sense of accomplishment and pride in what she does is soaring.

When she injures herself and the med tech tells her to stay off her ankle for a week, Alex is furious. She doesn’t feel like she can slow down or stop. The DEO is the first treadmill that has a speed custom set for her, to push her when she doesn’t think she can be pushed, to strengthen her and beat her ego down to the point where she’s able to see her weaknesses. Giving that up for a week sounds worse than going back to med school or sitting in seventh grade with idiots like Rick Treewater.

She should have known Hank wouldn’t let her take the week off. He puts her through the most mentally draining mock-interrogation imaginable, depriving her of sleep, withholding food and water for long stretches, poking at any threads of insecurity he can think of. He doesn’t do it to be cruel, she knows. It’s his job, and he takes no pleasure in it. But each time she crumbles and succumbs to tears, relenting and giving up information she knows she shouldn’t, she feels a physical pain, like she’s been cut open so she can scar over, tougher than before. 

He’s trying to get at something, and she doesn’t know what it is. She’s terrified he’ll find out before she does.

At the end of the week he sits before her, stoic and calm. He regards her as though debating what to say to her, scooting his chair back a few inches.

“How do you think you did?” he asks, and Alex can’t tell from his voice how he feels.

“Badly,” Alex says, her chest constricting at the admission. She’s never done anything badly in her life when she actually tried.

Hank considers her for a moment, then says. “You outperformed every agent that has ever gone through our training program.”

Alex sniffles, disbelieving. 

“I didn’t make it through  _ one day _ of that the first time I tried.”

Alex shrugs, not caring. She doesn’t hold herself to Hank’s standard. The only standards she’s ever cared about are the ones she sets for herself, the ones that are constantly moving farther in front of her, carrots she can never grasp.

“Danvers, you are the single most promising recruit our agency has ever seen. If you can continue with that level of commitment and fortitude, I might start worrying about my own job.”

It’s a tough compliment to swallow because it stands in such contrast to the way Alex feels right now: broken and exhausted and anything but fierce.

But it’s enough to push the carrot out a few inches further, wanting to prove she deserves his praise.

“Let’s keep going,” she says, swallowing.

Hank lets out a short, alarmed laugh. “ _ No _ . You will go home in a department vehicle, consume the requisite number of calories for such prolonged mental exertion, and you will sleep until you can stand up without staggering about like you were when I first met you. Is that clear?”

The reminder of her past is enough to humble her into obedience. She gets up and manages to walk in a relatively straight line toward the exit.

“One more thing, Danvers,” Hank calls after her.

Alex turns, a swell of vertigo hitting her at the change in direction.

“I hope you can get used to being called  _ Agent _ .” 

Alex freezes, thinking she must be hallucinating. Did he just call her  _ Agent _ ? She  _ must _ be hallucinating. He broke her down so far she’s lost touch with reality. He’d said she wouldn’t make agent for at least two years, and she’s only one year into her training.

But he smiles a rare, begrudging smile, following her with an extended hand.

“Welcome to the DEO, Agent Danvers. I’m proud of you.”

Hank is the first person in ten years to tell her he’s proud of her. 

The praise propels Alex out into an armored car idling for her, and somehow gets her into her apartment, picking up a cheeseburger and double order of fries on the way. She eats the food in what feels like five bites, then showers, feeling some of the flaky cracks of her battered shell sloughing off in the water. Then she falls into her bed and sleeps like she’s finally reached the edges of the universe and her hunger for knowledge has been sated. At least for now.  

Her ten hour nap is interrupted by Kara, who lets herself in and shakes Alex awake. Alex realizes just how effective her training has been when she finds herself pinning Kara to the floor.

Kara looks stunned, staring up at her in confusion.

Alex shouldn’t be able to deck Kara like this - well, she  _ wouldn’t _ be able to without the element of surprise on her side - and lets up, releasing Kara and wiping crust from the corner of her eye as she mumbles a begrudging,  _ Hello _ .

“Hey,” Kara says. “I was worried about you. And… now I’m even  _ more _ worried.”

Alex huffs. Kara is always worried about her, which is ridiculous. Alex can take care of herself. She’s annoyed that Kara keeps trying to get close when Alex has made it clear she doesn’t want that. The farther away Kara is, the less likely she’ll find out all Alex’s secrets. Before she was only trying to conceal her partying, but now there’s something bigger on the line, other people that will be affected if Kara finds out what she really does.

“I’m fine,” Alex grumbles. “Just… working long hours in the lab.”

Kara studies her, and if Alex didn’t know better she’d think Kara was using her x-ray vision to look into her mind for evidence of a lie. Alex is a great liar. The equipment at the DEO told her so. But those were impersonal lies that didn’t concern her as much.

Kara and her family knowing her secrets will always concern her.

She keeps her guard up, talking to Kara just long enough that she doesn’t seem openly hostile before sighing and making a pointed glance at her bed. Kara gets the hint and shows herself out.

Alex crawls back into bed, burrowing in the pillows and comforter, kept awake for a few minutes longer than she expected by the guilt she always feels over distancing herself from Kara. But it’s what she has to do. She has to sacrifice to protect her.

When she returns to the DEO two days later, she’s still filled with the same need to prove herself, but she’s calmer and more focused. She has a sense of purpose and belonging, and the confusing but oddly satisfying sense of being part of a team with a shared mission. She’s never worked with other people closely before. When she had group projects in high school and college she always just did them herself, not wanting to leave any fraction of her grade in the hands of peers with lesser intellect. But as she gets to know the other agents, she sees they are not lesser minds.

For the first time, there are galaxies whirling at the same speed as her own. 

For the next two years, she jumps on every mission, every tactical assault, every opportunity to mine data and analyze alien matter. She’s high on it, higher than she ever was with Natalie or a bottle of bourbon. She’s spun so hard, she’s reached her terminal velocity.

She’s finally gotten something right.

And then - of course - something goes wrong. Not something she did or thought of, not something that could be attributed to margin of error or her own fallibility. No, something goes wrong the last way she expected.

It isn’t so much the attack on flight 237 to Geneva. She’s been prepared for something like that all along. It’s the sheer audacity and stupidity Kara demonstrates when she rescues the plane, exposing herself to the world as the alien and mutant she is.

Alex has been working for ten years to prevent this, to put distance between them so Kara won’t do something so impulsive and alert all the escaped prisoners of Fort Rozz to her existence. But despite all that, staring back through the tiny oval window of the plane is her sister, looking frightened and strong and defiant.

Alex would smack her if she didn’t know she’d get knocked across the river in return.

She pretends she doesn’t see Kara, ignoring the imploring look on her face as she helps the flight attendants and captain evacuate the plane. Flashing her fake FBI badge, she gives instructions and counts heads as people wobble onto rafts and are hoisted onto a Coast Guard boat. She waits until the plane is completely empty before climbing out herself, refusing the blanket the Coast Guard offers her, tending to passengers’ injuries and taking a head count. 

Her steely coolness is just a cap for what she knows is brewing underneath.

After she’s been examined at NC General and given her heavily edited testimony to the police, she goes straight to the DEO where she knows Hank will be waiting for her.

She’s pretty sure she knows what he’ll ask her to do, and she doesn’t want to do it.

Sure enough, he tells her to go check on Kara before they bring her in for questioning.

This was what she was afraid of. The last thing she wanted was for her little sister to rouse any curiosity from her colleagues. She didn’t want Kara to be tested or questioned, but underneath that - however selfishly - she didn’t want these people whom she finally felt valued by to compare her to someone with superhuman capabilities. They know she has an alien sister, but they’ve never met her.

Still, Alex does what she’s been told to do. She lets herself into Kara’s apartment and stands watching her for a minute before she feels the first crashing wave of anger and disbelief overcome her.

“Oh my god.” 

Kara whirls around, surprised but overjoyed.

“I know! It’s incredible!” She rushes forward faster than she should and squeezes her so hard Alex wheezes and something pops. Her anger is diffused for a second at her sister’s touch; she has to make sure Kara is okay before she lays into her. It’s not like Kara can just go to NC General.

Kara pulls back. “I’m sorry, that was - that was too hard. I’m, I’m I’m just - I’m so excited. I still can’t believe I did it.”

“Yeah, neither can I.” Alex looks Kara up and down, wondering if any aliens have gotten to her already. “Are you okay?”

“Me? Am, am I okay, are  _ you _ ok?” 

Kara is spinning too fast, too high on her foolish heroism to understand the gravity of the situation.

Alex needs some gravity too, and though she hates to rely on her old vices, she reaches for the closest one. 

“I need a drink.”

“Right, yeah, we need to celebrate.” Kara goes to the kitchenette and starts rambling. “It has been so long, I almost forgot how to fly. Well, not so much  _ how _ but more- more, more how it  _ feels _ , like, scared, but  _ good _ scared, like, like, that moment right before you kiss someone for the first time.”

Alex frowns at her, wondering how flying - actual, unassisted flying - could ever be as uninspiring and dull as kissing Rick Treewater or Brian Dalay or Elliot Pitzer. 

Kara keeps talking at a speed almost inhuman. “... and now, now it’s like, I’m not sure what comes next, or maybe I am sure and I’m just afraid of what it means, if it means what I think it means-”

Alex has to stop her before she becomes a dervish in her own living room, alerting the onlookers from neighboring buildings to her alien nature.

“What were you thinking?” she snaps. 

Kara looks slapped in the face, and Alex finally has a window to reprimand her.

Kara has never been in more danger, and she’s completely oblivious. Alex has always been her protector, but she was never sure how much Kara should know. She could tell Kara about Fort Rozz, the alien prison Kara’s pod accidently dragged down to earth with her, but that would only encourage her. She’s so foolish she’d want to do something about it.

“You  _ exposed _ yourself to the world. You’re out there now, Kara. Everyone will know about you, and you can’t take that back.”

Alex sees Kara deflate, sees the fire in her eyes that even the river water couldn’t extinguish go out. She feels guilty for a moment, worried she came down too harsh. Kara’s moving and speaking at half speed now, shocked at Alex’s anger.

Kara says she’s tired from carrying a plane on her back, and Alex feels inadequate all over. She’s been training for years, and she still can only carry twice her own dead weight. She can’t stop herself from rolling her eyes. If it pushes Kara further away, good. She can’t be close to her. Especially not now. 

She turns with a final blow, one that could actually hurt her.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Alex leaves, feeling like she punched herself in the heart rather than Kara.

* * *

 

It isn’t long before Hank informs Alex Kara is being brought in for questioning. 

Alex  _ hates _ that this is how Kara will find out.  _ Hates _ it, hates it so much she almost gets down on her knees to beg Hank not to make her face Kara in the room where she’s cuffed to the table, subdued by kryptonite. But she thinks of the scared look she knows will be on Kara’s face, the same scared face Kara had that first night in their house, and she can’t stay away. Being an agent was never about her. It was about protecting Kara and other innocents, and if she’s going to let her ego get in the way of doing that right now, when she can literally protect her both emotionally and physically, she doesn’t deserve to be called an agent. 

So she stands in the room, almost tearing her hair out in agony for the entire half hour it takes Kara to regain consciousness. 

And just as she expected, Kara’s confusion and fear flashes to hurt and betrayal so quickly, any apology Alex might have given is rendered useless. 

She settles for monitoring Kara’s vitals and making sure she’s safe to sit and stand once she tries. 

She watches Kara like a hawk the whole time Hank is orienting her to the DEO, hoping Kara won’t take the full weight of the blame he’s so keen to place on her for Fort Rozz. She sees that scared little girl who hid from the popcorn maker all over again, and her heart breaks. 

She can’t keep pushing her away. Now that her secret is out, she might as well try to mend that bridge. So she does. She supports Kara’s decision to be Supergirl, and though she has reservations - closets full of them - she puts on a brave face, rescuing Kara whenever she takes on more than she can handle alone.

If Alex thought her job was hard before, it becomes doubly so now that Kara is involved. 

* * *

Kara’s stubborn insistence that she’s going to help with Fort Rozz rests heavy on Alex’s shoulders. She feels responsible. Kara’s going to get killed by some alien convict they haven’t caught yet, and it’ll be her fault.

But when Kara slaps her in the face with Alex’s own fear that she only got recruited because she has an alien for a sister, Alex steps back, seeing Kara in a new light. She may be obnoxiously optimistic and friendly, but she can punch when she needs to. And she knew just where Alex’s weak spot was.

If Kara can punch that hard at her own sister, maybe she really can fight crime.

She sees the last ten years more clearly now. She knows she needs to make amends. So she arranges to check out the holographic projection of Kara’s mother and brings it to Kara’s apartment. It’s an olive branch. She stands behind Kara, ready to support her if she needs it, and hopes Kara understands what this means.

After she dries Kara’s tears and tells her she can be the hero she wants to be, they come up with a plan for Kara to do the most good she can.

* * *

Alex feels like the last ten years of her life are catching up to her.

Not in a way that means she’s headed for a break. She just realizes how stupid she’s been at times, how callous and closed off. She doesn’t want to be that way anymore. It feels immature.

She’s not sure what to do about it, though. She briefly considers seeing a therapist or something, but laughs the idea off. They’d have her committed the minute she mentions anything about her work. Aliens? A secret government agency? A sister from another planet? No therapist would know what do with her.

Instead she finds comfort in her one constant: Kara’s unwavering desire to see and do good in the world. Alex timidly suggests they spend time together every week, thinking it sounds silly and needy. But Kara is enthusiastic, quickly instating “traditions” they’ve never actually had. 

And it’s so nice. It’s the soft spot in Alex’s week, the one time she knows she can let down her guard and be however messy or weak she needs to be. Kara always receives her with grace.

Alex doesn’t feel like anything is chasing her anymore. And though she won’t admit it to anyone, she starts to think maybe Kara has a point that most people want to do good. But it’s just a flickering thought.

* * *

 

A few months into Kara’s involvement with the DEO, Hank assigns Alex to train the newest recruit, a woman named Priya whose work in bioelectromagnetism in alien life forms caught the attention of the DEO.

Priya is a tall woman with sharp features and a surprisingly gentle smile. She shakes Alex’s hand and Alex is almost startled by how soft it is; her colleagues have calloused and tough hands like her own. She takes it as an indicator of how hard she’ll have to work Priya to get her in shape.

Priya is chatty and amicable, inquiring about Alex’s background and current projects. She seems to want to know everything about Alex. It goes beyond being colleagues, and Alex grows suspicious, wondering what information Priya is angling for. She gives curt responses and refocuses Priya on whatever computer system or weapon she’s explaining. She dislikes the constant meandering of Priya’s mind. She doesn’t know if Priya has what it takes to be a real agent.

So she decides to push her beyond what would normally be necessary to train a new agent. She doesn’t hold back when they spar, not even in the beginning. No one took it easy on her, so she’d be doing a disservice to Priya if she did, right? She finds every possible nick of weakness and pushes on it. She finds all of Priya’s published research and critiques it, asking Priya to explain why the alpha was so weak in her statistical analysis, why she hadn’t used a more generalized sample in her earliest undergraduate research, why she thought a quasi-experiment had any place in a peer-reviewed journal.

Through all this Priya smiles, a warm, too-calm smile that makes Alex even more uncomfortable and suspicious of her.

The problem is that Priya is smart. Very smart. Smart enough that when she finds errors in Alex’s work, she doesn’t point them out directly. Instead she asks questions, forcing Alex to talk through her process and realize the error herself, which is perhaps the most aggravating thing she could do. Alex likes people that get right to the point, and Priya seems to dance around it, using methods and wiles Alex doesn’t understand.

She also hates when Priya brings up her sister. It’s uncomfortable in a way it usually isn’t with her colleagues. Priya seems strangely captivated beyond normal scientific curiosity. 

“You’re still not sure about her working here,” Priya says one day.

Alex tries to shrug it off, refocusing their attention on something more pressing.

“You’re like her, you know.”

Alex scoffs, offended and flattered at the same time. 

Priya persists. “You’d make the same choices if you had her powers.”

Alex is startled enough that she turns to look at Priya, and catches her looking not at Alex’s face, but somewhere down her body. Alex has seen that look before, but it’s always been on a man. 

The only way Alex knows she can persistently best Priya is in sparring, and she takes great pleasure in decking her, barking out instructions for how Priya could have blocked her, how she should have anticipated Alex’s moves. Every time she knocks her down, Priya just takes a deep breath and gets back up, rubbing her shoulder or wrist and bracing herself for the next jab.

And then one day Alex pins her down, faces close, breath fast and hot, and Priya pauses before giving their signal for defeat. Instead she takes a moment to stare, her mouth twitching with a threatening smile, which makes Alex rage. She leaps back, scowling, and storms out of the room straight to Hank.

“Find someone else to train Priya,” she demands. 

Hank sizes Alex up, taking in her bristled, panting stance.

“May I ask why, Agent Danvers?”

“She’s not responding to my techniques,” Alex snaps, already turning to go back to her lab where she can be alone with her numbers and molecules.

If Hank replies, Alex doesn’t hear it.

Alex is surprised when Priya comes to visit her a few days later, smiling and chatty as always. It’s as if Priya doesn’t know that Alex rejected her as a trainee. Priya seems to be looking for reasons to hang around. She asks idiotic questions about the project Alex is working on - breaking down the molecular structure of Valeronion muscle tissue - and asking for tips on how to get through her training. She throws in a few heavy-handed compliments, at which Alex all but rolls her eyes. The woman is so transparent, trying to get Alex to help her pass her training.

Ironically, if Priya weren’t so desperate, Alex might have actually been willing to talk her through some of the tougher points of training. But the way she speaks to Alex and smiles so much makes Alex bristle. 

When Priya doesn’t pass the psychological endurance training, Alex feels vindicated. She knew something wasn’t right with Priya. Her instincts are good. The only thing that puzzles her is why Priya had roused such suspicion in her from the start. There wasn’t anything objective Alex could point to: connections to distrusted entities, gaps in her history, lack of stamina. There was only an unsettled feeling, a pervasive discomfort whenever Priya was hovering around or working with her.

Alex is relieved Priya is gone, but she can’t shake the strange feeling of resentment that clings to her. She hopes that Hank learned from his failed attempt at making her a trainer and doesn’t ask her to train a prospective agent again. Especially if the recruit is female.

* * *

Alex doesn’t drink as much these days. She can have just one drink without it turning into a night she doesn’t remember. She feels civilized, being able to enjoy a single glass of bourbon or whiskey after a long day.

Still, there are occasional nights when she has three or four glasses and regrets it the next day. 

One night she’s three bourbons in and gets her laptop out. She’s been wondering recently why none of her relationships worked out. It could be the reason she doesn’t have many friends -- she’s too intense, too fixated on her career, too uncompromising and, according to one girl she overheard at Stanford before she became Fun Alex, “abrasive.” Maybe she was all those things with her dates and that made them run away.

She opens the Facebook page she barely uses and types in the names of the guys she’s dated. She starts with Rick Treewater. She feels subtly vindicated to discover he’s still in Midvale, working at his dad’s auto shop, drinking with his buddies, unchanged save for a beer belly and some stubble and, apparently, a wife. But the next few names she looks up are less reassuring. Brian Dalay is now a mechanical engineer working for BMW in Germany. Elliot Pittman is working at Johns Hopkins. In a detached way, she’s proud and happy for them.

Was she really the problem with Brian and Elliot then? They’re clearly successful and on her level intellectually. They’re attractive, and they had never been anything but polite and respectful to her.

Maybe they weren’t the problem. Maybe something is broken with her, something no mechanical engineer or programmer can identify. 

She closes the computer, finishing her drink. She stares at the bottle, debating pouring herself another.

But she isn’t that girl anymore, and if the DEO hasn’t broken her, she isn’t broken. It’s just how she is. She’s built for more important and practical things than romance.

It’s probably a good thing, to not let men distract her. She needs all her energy and focus for work, to protect her sister, to protect her community. She understands why people feel called to public service now. She may have fallen into it unwittingly, but she’s proud of the work she does, that her intellect can be used to improve galaxies she’s not even aware of. It’s the best thing about her.

She’s not broken. She’s just Alex, and according to the DEO, that’s enough.

Still, sometimes it doesn’t feel like it.

She gets up, taking the bottle back to the kitchen, rinsing her glass before climbing into bed. 

Despite her resolve, she decides to test her theory over the next few weeks. Maybe her work at the DEO has adjusted her enough that she doesn’t need to be so discerning with men. Maybe she can date someone for fun, just to have a good time. 

If she’s going to make any kind of effort, she has to find someone who can keep up with her. Finding someone who can keep up with her mind who isn’t a colleague is a tall order so she decides to focus on the physical. She feels alive in her own body lately, due to her rigorous training, and maybe what she needs is a guy who can keep up with her in that regard.

So she goes to a local boxing gym, pretending to be interested in taking classes, and after showing off in the ring for one of the trainers, is assigned a sparring partner. It’s stupid easy for her, of course, but she uses it as a new kind of challenge: to see if she can relate to a man on a personal level.

She may be out of practice, but she remembers how she used to use her long hair and a cool demeanor to flirt with men in exchange for them boosting her ego. She does it again, and the guy she sets her sights on, a muscular, tan guy named Brady whose IQ is probably hovering around half of hers, takes the bait right away. 

He invites her out to dinner with a dopey, over-bleached smile that makes Alex resent him for some reason. She agrees, on one condition: he has to beat her in the ring first.

He looks stricken, then mumbles something about not punching a girl. She challenges him, and his response isn’t encouraging. But she’s not supposed to be concerned about his intelligence. She’s testing herself, seeing if she can do the thing that’s not remotely intuitive to her. 

She gets him in the ring, and he takes a few swings at her, all of which she blocks, counter punching him twice. He looks stunned, then comes at her full-force, which she easily dodges. In a few minutes he’s on the mat, giving the signal of defeat.

She steps back, satisfied. But then he grins up at her and says, “Hope you’re like this in bed.”

And she’s back on him, punching the shit out of his stupid face, only stopping once she’s sure he won’t say anything else crude.

* * *

There’s an unusual alien kidnapping that has everyone at the DEO stumped, hungry for leads, wondering how they could have absolutely no clue what’s happening. They’re supposed to be the experts on aliens, after all. But they don’t usually deal with such trivial things as kidnappings. They’re trying to stop intergalactic crime. They can wield uzis, but a homemade slingshot has them confounded.

When Hank suggests going to the local PD, Alex is more than a little reluctant. What could they know that the DEO doesn’t? She goes with Hank to the precinct, and is disheartened by how uncooperative Detectives Warren and Draper are at first. They’re everything she expected: smug, ego-driven, always looking for the a pissing contest. She knows they should be on the same side, but she despises them so instantly, she’s doubtful any partnership would yield progress.

Despite her expertise in body language, she can’t tell if they’re actually aware of alien presence in National City. They seem more interested in checking out her ass. But when Detective Warren leaves the room, Draper mentions a string of alien murders unlike anything the DEO has seen before. Apparently bodies are piling up, all of them decapitated, their heads and necks cauterized by some kind of laser. He says something about a man with gills, seemingly to test her, and she’s pretty sure they know more than they’re willing to share.

Alex’s usual charms don’t work on these men. They’re probably immune to it, as it would be the first thing a lot of civilians would try. Without more information, she’s resigned to rolling her eyes and preparing to argue next time Hank suggests they try to work with local law enforcement. 

But then they get a lead, and it’s a race to stop the local PD from getting there first and blowing the whole investigation up by going public too soon. Kara stops their cruiser, and Warren and Draper get out, but then things get hairy.

Draper pulls a gun and shoots first Alex and then his partner. Alex goes down hard, air forced from her lungs just before Warren falls next to her. Kara darts over, making sure she’s okay. And she is okay, thanks to the kevlar vest she was smart enough to put on. But she’s shaken and more certain than ever that she fucking hates cops. 

 

* * *

When Kara voluntarily flies Fort Rozz into space to save the citizens of earth, Alex realizes Priya was right. She and Kara are not that different. She would have done the same. But she doesn’t want Kara to have to sacrifice herself. So she flies Kara’s pod just out of the atmosphere, pushing her sister back into the clutches of gravity, and ensures they’ll be able to continue fighting evil in the world together. Because that’s how it should be.

She loves her sister, cherishes all the time they spend together now. She’s so overwhelmingly glad she’s started to mend that bond. But it’s still hard, and she loses sleep over Kara, and she wonders if things will ever start to feel normal again. “Normal” being an objective term, of course, for a girl who hunts aliens for a living.

Little does she know how strange the next few months will be, and how a visit from the President will trigger a series of events not even the DEO could prepare her for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't forget to read Maggie's chapter in "Cliffjumper" too! You might see a little sneaky connection...


	4. Window

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, yes, they finally meet!
> 
> Sorry this took so long to get out. I'll try to be faster. Thanks to @youreterriblemuriel and @agentmuffin for helping me with this tricky chapter.
> 
> For those who may not know, I'm presenting a workshop at Clexacon this weekend titled "Fan Fiction and the Art of a Good Love Scene." I know I haven't proven my chops in that arena in *this* story yet (I will!) but I hope, if you're going, you'll attend anyway. I'd love to see some friendly faces in the crowd.
> 
> Enjoy!

When Clark shows up and decides to mentor Kara, Alex feels like she can rest easy for a few weeks knowing someone else is looking out for her sister. She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t a  _ little _ jealous that he can do it so well; she’s helped Kara manage her powers, helped her learn to channel them more effectively, but she doesn’t have the firsthand experience Kal-El has. But the break is nice. It gives her a chance to sift through the test results they’ve collected for the boy that landed in the Kryptonian pod, trying to figure out who he is. She loves being able to really sink her teeth into it without distraction.

 

That is, until Kara tells her she wants to move to Metropolis with Clark. 

 

It’s like a slap in the face.

 

Alex isn’t used to feeling betrayed. Not like this, and never by Kara. She’s always been the one asking for forgiveness. For being distant, for lying, for killing Astra.

 

But Kara’s flippant remark about uprooting as though everything in Alex’s life isn’t centered around her cuts so deep, Alex can’t even respond at first.

 

With this hurt comes the realization that her obligation to Kara doesn’t feel like an obligation anymore. It’s a choice. She loves Kara, and given the choice between anything else and her sister, she’d choose her sister every time. Willingly and gladly.

 

She aches because it suddenly feels one-sided. 

 

Alex isn’t going to let her go without a fight. 

 

So she does the thing she never used to do. She tells Kara how much it hurts to hear that she is so disposable, that the relationship they finally have doesn’t matter to her. And Kara responds with all the sweetness and care Alex hoped wais there. She promises not to leave Alex. 

 

She’s relieved, but something still feels unsettled. She never thought it would feel like that, like Kara, with all her superhuman strength and goodness, wasn’t enough.

 

Maybe she isn’t. 

 

But she doesn’t have time to ruminate on that thought for long.  The DEO gets word that the President is planning a visit, and any semblance of a break is gone.

 

High profile visits like this make Alex uneasy. There’s more room for error than usual, more chance of some kind of exposure to the public or opportunity to make the agency look bad. She feels like she needs to be in fifteen places at once.

 

And of course, this time something does go wrong. More than one thing, actually.

 

First, the boy breaks out of the DEO and starts wreaking havoc on National City. They have a hard time tracking him down, and everyone is on pins and needles hoping something doesn’t happen when the President arrives. 

 

It does immediately, of course.

 

The boy tries to set the President on fire and she barely makes it into her armored car, even with Kara’s help.

 

The whole department is thrown for a loop. An assassination attempt on the President is the highest profile case the DEO has ever handled. Still, the President’s site visit goes smoothly, save for a little tension with J'onn, and Alex almost feels like they got away with something.

 

Almost.

 

Alex shows up to inspect the crime scene determined to figure out what the hell happened. This kind of thing is exactly why the DEO was created, and it’s another opportunity for Alex to prove herself. She’s proud of what she does and what it means.

 

Unfortunately local PD are already there ordering a forensics team to gather up Alex’s evidence. Alex has dealt with local cops a few times before, and it’s always been a waste of time at best. They’ve never been helpful, save for one or two measly tips. Most recently when Alex tried to partner with them, she got shot and almost decapitated by the rogue Fort Rozz guard who had been posing as an NCPD detective. The NCPD hadn’t even noticed something was off with him, and had Alex not been wearing her kevlar or had help from Kara, she might not be around to around to resent them for it.

 

So to say Alex isn’t fond of local cops is putting it mildly.

 

But the cops are already there and Alex can’t wish them away. It’s a paperwork disaster. She’ll have to file reports on what potential information the local PD may have come across, figure out what their rudimentary analyses might contain. She doesn’t want J'onn to lay into her about it - she’s had a long week and it’s only Tuesday - so she strides across the scene and confronts the detective who’s taken on the scene as though it was actually under her purview. The last thing Alex needs is some zealous local cop messing up her investigation. Alex almost wants to pat her on the head and send her back to the police academy for a review of protocol. 

 

Instead she goes in on the offensive.

 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing in my crime scene?”

 

Alex gets the impulse to gear up for a full mental takedown, but it’s not worth the mental energy. She just needs to get this cop out of the way, which should be easy enough. 

 

But when Detective Sawyer introduces herself, Alex fumbles for a moment before responding. She notices the cut of her jaw the shape of her eyebrows, the spread of her lips in a smirk. Alex isn’t used to a woman treating her like this: no pleasantries, no big smiles, no sense that they’re somehow in this together. It’s nice, in a way, but something about Sawyer unnerves her. Her eye contact is piercing and she holds herself sturdy and strong despite her petite build. Alex lays into her with all the resentment she’s got built up from her last encounter with NCPD detectives and then some. 

 

Sawyer bites back. 

 

Alex wasn’t expecting that. It throws her. But she’ll probably never see her again, so she lets Detective Sawyer take the full brunt of her irritation and doesn’t stop until Sawyer relents. It’s satisfying, but as she walks away she feels like Sawyer still got in a few good punches.

 

Sawyer is right about one thing though: they’re probably dealing with a Kryptonian. Alex isn’t sure how Sawyer knew that, but it makes sense. Alex had been almost sure - she’s pretty familiar with Kryptonians, after all - but she didn’t want to assume the assailant was Kryptonian just because it was what she was familiar with. But Sawyer confirmed it. Not that Alex will admit she had been helpful. She is, after all, just a local cop.

 

With the crime scene rightfully under her purview, Alex runs data through her programs, searching for matching burn patterns in the database. She finds a match, has Winn run some diagnostics on it, tracking recent movement of related energetic fields in the immediate area, and boom, they have a hit.

 

Alex leads the tactical team in, weapons raised, full gear on as they kick down doors, shouting for anyone inside to surrender. Alex loves the rush of it, loves the way it feels to bark at a group of her peers, loves being fully loaded.

 

This is what keeps her going. This power, this purpose, this laser-focus on doing what is right and protects the citizens of National City. It may be dangerous, but it’s a means unto a greater end. 

 

She sees someone crouching, unclear in the dim light, and lifts her weapon higher, shouting before the person stands, hands in the air and an oddly smug smile on her face for someone surrounded by a fully loaded tactical team prepared to shoot her.

 

It’s Detective Sawyer.

 

Some nerve, this idiot cop has.

 

And even more nerve to openly mock Alex in front of her team. Alex bristles, swooping down to pick up the sole clue she sees on the lot - the Krytonian’s ankle bracelet - and pulls her team out.

 

If this detective messes with one more of her assignments, she’s going to take her down, no holds barred. 

 

She tells J'onn about what happened when she gets back to headquarters. He’s more than a little concerned about Sawyer’s knowledge about the DEO. He asks Alex what he knows about Sawyer, and Alex just shrugs and says she’s unhelpful, has a bad attitude, and a knack for finding information she isn’t supposed to have.

 

“Let’s hope she doesn’t get too curious,” J'onn says. “Anything else comes up, we need to get her in the database. See what she knows. Scope her out a little bit.”

 

Alex nods, wondering how she can get out of this one. She’ll have to just do what she needs to do and then hope it doesn’t cost her much.

 

She calls to take care of loose threads, hoping it will be brief.

 

“I have some paperwork I need you to sign.”

 

“What kind of paperwork?”

 

“A nondisclosure agreement.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because technically the DEO doesn’t exist.”

 

“But it  _ does _ exist.”

 

“I need you to sign,” Alex insists.

 

Sawyer pauses, and Alex can just picture her smug smile relishing that she had the upper hand. 

 

“Okay. But I want to know what the DEO does with the aliens they capture.”

 

“That’s classified information.”

 

“I thought you needed me to sign the NDA.”

 

“Sawyer,” Alex warns.

 

“Fine. Send it over.”

 

Alex is prepared to hang up as soon as possible, but something’s nagging at her at the back of her mind. So she asks Sawyer how she got to the warehouse before the DEO. She really is stumped as to how she pulled that off. 

 

Sawyer, of course, gives her an evasive answer. 

 

“My mechanic is near the warehouse you and your crew busted into so subtly.”

 

Alex rolls her eyes, knowing she’s not going to get the full story.

 

She hangs up, determined to let her irritation go. 

 

Sawyer, it seems, plans to make that impossible. A few hours later she invites Alex to meet her, but not at the NCPD lab or even a crime scene. She tells Alex to bring the paperwork and meet her near the warehouse she managed to get to before Alex a few days earlier.

 

Alex knows this cop is angling for something. Whether it’s intel or bragging rights or just the smug satisfaction of having messed with Alex’s mission, Alex isn’t sure. But it’s laughable that Sawyer thinks she can show Alex anything new when it comes to aliens. Alex has devoted the last three years of her life to round-the-clock study of alien life forms and processes, while the NCPD science division has a broader scope and less tech on their side. Sawyer can’t have been a detective long. She’s too young to have more than a few years under her belt. She’s probably as overexcited and trigger-happy as Alex had been during her first few weeks at the DEO.

 

Alex isn’t sure whether she should meet her at all. She could just have a courier taken the NDA to Sawyer and be done with it. 

 

But she doesn’t trust a courier to read Sawyer’s body language or figure out what this cop wants. So she agrees, tucking her gun into her waistband for good measure. 

 

But when they meet up, Sawyer surprises her. She brings her to a bar that has an unusual and mellow vibe. Alex doesn’t hate it. She hasn’t been in a bar in a long time. But something about it feels off.  If Maggie wanted intel, she could have picked anywhere to meet up. She must have chosen this one for a reason.

 

Alex feels her hackles raise. Something’s different about this place, and not in a good way. She takes comfort in the gun pressed against her back.

 

“This is your big hookup? A dive bar?” Alex asks critically.

 

Sawyer smirks. “Look closer.”

 

It only takes a split second for Alex to see she’s not among humans, save for Sawyer. There are metahumans with visible abnormalities everywhere. 

 

She panics. Sawyer has led her straight into the lion’s den. She’s got no backup, and her only ammo is the few bullets already in her gun. She reaches for it, but Sawyer is quick, jamming the gun back in her belt as though to tell her she has no chance in this place. Alex’s only hope is to not attract attention to herself.

 

They move to a table and Alex’s adrenaline spikes. Her mind is spinning as she tries to process everything she’s seeing and hearing. She keeps an eye on the door in case she needs to make a swift exit. 

 

It’s so much to take in. Some of the aliens around them are species Alex has heard of but never seen in person. She’s simultaneously intrigued and terrified. She doesn’t want to let on how overwhelmed she is, so she plays it cool. Or at least she tries to.

 

Sawyer, on the other hand, seems to be compensating for how freaked out Alex is. She’s so relaxed, so at home and casual. She chats with the waitress, Darla, for a moment, something about moving on that has Sawyer looking smug. Alex is distracted by the nonverbal communication going on between them. It surpasses everything Alex is used to seeing between people who know each other well, everything she’s been trained in. There’s eye contact and meaningful expressions exchanged, but there’s something else too.

 

Darla doesn’t seem to have  any visible metahuman traits, and given that so few species have the ability to conceal themselves or morph, the list of possibilities narrows down. Darla is either human or one of a handful of humanoid species.

 

Given the silent communication between them, Alex takes an educated guess. Once Darla is behind the bar again, Alex says, “That waitress -- is she Roltikkon?” As she says it, she hears some disbelief and awe in her voice she wishes she could stamp out. She doesn’t want to give Sawyer the satisfaction of knowing she’s a little bit impressed.

 

But Sawyer knows. “Yes, she is.”

 

Alex can’t stop her encyclopedic response. It’s like a tic. “I’ve heard that Roltikkon can form telepathic connections by making contact with the dorsum of the tongue.”

 

Sawyer looks even more smug. “How do you think she learned English? She’s my ex.”

 

Alex stumbles for a minute before she’s able to compose herself. It’s not that she cares Sawyer is gay - she doesn’t, like, at all - she’s just caught off guard by how confident and casual Sawyer is about it. Alex always thought gay people carried some kind of shame or secrecy until someone was in their inner circle, which Alex is far from with Detective Sawyer. Alex probably overcompensates with how casual she tries to make her reaction, but luckily Sawyer changes the subject quickly. 

 

A scruffy alien with a forehead that looks like a shitty massage chair approaches Alex with a lecherous glint in his eye. He tries to hit on her, and Alex just stares at him, thinking about her gun, thinking about locking him up in the DEO, thinking about all the ways she could inflict pain on him. But she keeps her cool because it’s what she’s been trained to do until she has a plan. And right now her plan is to get out of this place as soon as she can. 

 

Sawyer is trying to get info on the rogue Kryptonian from the guy, but she’s being too friendly. Alex jumps in with some more forceful tactics. She twists his arm until he drops the gross come-on.

 

She gets enough information to track the pan-orbital transmissions the Kryptonian boy is trying to send and storms out, not even bothering to thank Sawyer. Why would she, after what she just pulled. Alex hates feeling cornered and unprepared. She feels like Sawyer did it just to see her squirm.

 

She rushes back to the DEO where she relays the information. Winn’s sensors detect that the alien boy isn’t trying to contact Krypton, but Daxam, a planet Kara apparently hates. Alex should have known. Detective Sawyer had no idea what she was talking about when she said the assailant was Kryptonian. The scorch marks look nothing like Kara’s. They track him down and take him into custody and Alex feels like she can hold her head high again.

 

J’onn encourages Alex and Kara to go to the signing of the Alien Amnesty Act. “Your fingerprints are all over it,” he says with a twinkle in his eye. 

 

Alex wonders if it’s true, if the work of the DEO has brought about enough stability that aliens can come out of the shadows and walk amongst people. 

 

Alex hasn’t had a lot of time to think about the Alien Amnesty Act. Kara and J’onn seem to support it, and it will sure make Alex’s job easier if there’s a formal record of alien registrants. She goes to the signing mostly because it’s a nice break from the lab.

 

She’s not surprised to see Detective Sawyer is there.

 

“Agent Danvers,” she says with a too-cheerful grin.

 

“Sawyer,” Alex says, feeling both guilty and annoyed.

 

“Call me Maggie,” she says, then gestures with her head to walk further into the crowd to watch the signing. “The President must be relieved you got the guy trying to kill her.”

 

Alex begrudgingly follows and gives her a little credit. Without the tip from the guy in the bar Maggie brought her to, the DEO might not have been able to track the Daxamite before he made another attempt on the President’s life. Plus she’s a little smug the DEO managed to apprehend him before the NCPD even had a clue what to look for.

 

Maggie asks where the Daxamite is now, and Alex knows she’s either goading or pressing for information. She avoids a real response to keep the upper hand.  

 

Maggie looks oddly cheerful and proud for someone who didn’t even get close to solving a case. Alex keeps looking over at her, wondering what her deal is.

 

“How do you feel about all this?” Maggie asks, nodding toward the podium where the President will sign the Alien Amnesty Act any minute.

 

“Um-” Alex stalls. “Good?”

 

Maggie raises her eyebrows for a brief moment, not making eye contact. “Would have thought you’d hate it. Giving aliens rights and all.”

 

“No,” Alex says too quickly. “It’s… fine.”

 

Maggie gives her an unimpressed look and Alex feels like she needs to defend herself.

 

Luckily, the President starts to speak and she’s off the hook.

 

Alex feels nervous, and she can’t place it. She looks to Maggie, then looks around the crowd, wondering how many of them know the threat aliens pose. She sees Kara floating above, gazing adoringly down at the President. She wants this event to be over so she can go back to work and figure out if Daxamites have any reason to be threatening the President or if that’s just part of their unpleasant nature.

 

Suddenly there are two giant balls of flame hurtling toward the President and Alex goes into defense mode.

 

Everything happens so fast. Supergirl is covering the President, so Alex looks around for the attacker. She spots her immediately, but not before two more flame balls hurtle toward Kara and the President, knocking them off the platform.

 

Alex draws her gun and fires fast, but next thing she knows she’s flying through the air, flaming, landing hard on her back in the fountain. She hits hard, air knocked out of her.

 

She struggles to get up, sloshing around in the water. She looked up just in time to see Maggie, weapon raised, confronting the attacker. Then a wall of flame goes up and she can’t see what’s happening.

 

By the time she’s back on her feet, it feels like too much time has passed. She checks that Kara’s okay and sees her rushing to put out fires. She keeps looking around and knows Maggie’s missing right away. It’s an umbrella consciousness the DEO helped her cultivate that enables her to know where every member of her team is when they go out. 

 

And even though there’s no physical evidence to suggest it, Alex knows she’s been taken. Maggie wouldn’t flee a crime scene like that. If anything, she’d run headlong into it. 

 

She wonders why the alien kidnapped  _ Maggie _ of all people. A local police officer isn’t exactly a great bargaining chip in a federal hostage situation aimed at taking down the President. But Maggie’s definitely been taken, and Alex instinctively knows she’s got to get her back to safety.

 

It isn’t really Alex’s job to rescue her. But regardless of what team they’re on, Maggie is law enforcement, and so is Alex, and they leave no one behind. 

 

Alex is unsettled in a way that feels personal. In the simple act of disappearing, Maggie has suddenly proven she’s on Alex’s team, that she really does want to protect National City. Alex feels like she owes it to Maggie to rescue her as an act of apology.  She feels a panicked urgency to find Maggie, and also like maybe she deserves to feel this terrible for being so ungrateful for Maggie’s help before.

 

When the DEO comes up short finding anything other than a few images of the attacker, images of Maggie being tortured or killed flash through Alex’s mind.  Even if she is a cop, Maggie is a good person and doesn’t deserve that. She feels personally responsible, like Maggie’s kidnapping is her fault because she didn’t correctly identify the attacker.

 

She calls the NCPD and talks to some idiot there who doesn’t seem to know Maggie’s missing yet. He mumbles for a minute, calling over his shoulder to someone in the precinct before giving a sheepish response that yeah, Sawyer is missing and they’re working it, but they’ve got no leads either.

 

She hates that she has no other options, but they have nothing to go on, not a single lead to look for the alien Alex now realizes is Infernian. It’s a hot day and tracking heat patterns doesn’t work. So she does the only thing she can: she goes to the bar Maggie brought her to.

 

It’s exponentially more terrifying going in now that she knows what’s inside. But she’s prepared this time, two fully loaded guns concealed, backup waiting just a few blocks away, earpiece in place ready to call them. She knows force isn’t the best way to get accurate information, but it’s often the quickest. 

 

She’s on high alert, ready to fight at the first sign of conflict. She walks in, too aggressive perhaps, and then feels a bit silly. It’s just a mostly-empty room with pool tables and some tables and chairs. It’s not any different than a regular dive, save for the clientele who don’t even glance up when she storms in.

 

She sees the guy with the weird massage chair forehead, stalks over to him, and demands information. She’s ornery and he’s obstinate in his refusal to tell her anything, and the few seconds he tries to toy with her are enough to flip him off his barstool and choke him out with its rungs. 

 

The bartender hops to his defense and Alex’s assistance, giving her a general geographical area to explore. Alex is grateful to have any lead at all, but rushes out of the bar before she can say  _ Thank you _ . In situations like these, every second counts.

 

Winn figures out where the Infernian is and Kara flies Alex there, not wanting to waste a second. With any luck, Alex will save two lives tonight; the President’s, of course, and Maggie’s. If they can get there in time. A swath of DEO vehicles is on the way as backup, but time is of the essence.

 

Kara goes in first, making sure it’s safe for Alex to enter. She gets the signal and sneaks in the side while Kara distracts the Infernian. She sees Maggie, small and defenseless, tied up and trying to wriggle her hands out. Alex feels her heart race, guilty for anything she did that got Maggie into this situation. She slides up to her, signalling to be quiet, inspecting the ropes tethering Maggie to a set of steel beams. The Infernian must have joined some sort of evil scout troop as a child because Alex has never seen knots like these. 

 

She cuts Maggie down and they have a silent exchange.

 

_ You okay? _

 

Maggie nods, rubbing her wrists and shoulders.

 

Alex motions with her head to follow her, and they slink along the periphery of the room toward the side exit.

 

The Infernian hears them and sends two flame balls in their direction, throwing them forcibly onto the ground. They manage to roll before their clothing catches fire, but Alex still feels singed. Her gun falls out of her holster as she slides along the pavement, scraping her thigh and shoulder through her clothes.

 

Kara intervenes, giving them enough time to take cover behind some barrels. Alex sees that Kara’s struggling to get a handle on the alien. She tells turns to Maggie and says, “Get the gun and get out,” and goes in to help Kara. Maggie objects, but Alex would sooner die than leave Kara to her own defenses, super as they are.

 

It ends up being Maggie who subdues Scorcher in the end. Alex is pleasantly surprised the cop had it in her. She almost offers to let Maggie cuff the Infernian as a reward for her quick thinking, but Maggie’s cuffs are kid stuff compared to Alex’s. Kara uses her ice breath for added precaution. If Scorcher were to wake up, at least they’d have a few seconds to get ahead of her.

 

Then it’s weirdly quiet. Kara’s put out the fires in the warehouse and there’s nothing to be done but wait for the battery of DEO vehicles to arrive. Alex uses the opportunity to check on Maggie.

 

“You okay?”

 

“Fine,” Maggie says. But she’s frowning and looking at her hand. 

 

Alex steps toward her and sees a nasty burn on her palm. It’s bubbling a little bit and will take a while to heal.

 

“Ouch,” Alex says in sympathy. 

 

“It’s fine,” Maggie repeats, turning her palm down and the burn out of sight. “She zapped my gun before she grabbed me.”

 

Kara reaches down to pick up a shard of ice and hands it to Maggie. Alex wishes she’d thought of it. Maggie lets out a begrudging hum and winces as she clasps the ice.

 

“Anywhere else?” Alex asks.

 

Maggie looks down at herself, checking for any cuts or burns she didn’t feel, then touches her collarbone and shoulder where she skidded when Scorcher hurled a wave of fire at them.

 

“Nothing major.”

 

“We’ll get you checked out,” Alex assures her.

 

“I’m fine,” Maggie insists.

 

“Please, it’s the least we can do,” Kara chimes in.

 

Maggie glances around the warehouse anxiously before looking back at the alien.

 

There’s an awkward silence, and Alex has a lot of questions.

 

“No offense, but why the hell did she kidnap  _ you _ of all people?” 

 

If she hadn’t just seen Maggie take a steel pipe to the Infernian’s head, she wouldn’t have considered Maggie a valuable hostage. 

 

“She thought I was DEO,” Maggie grumbled. “She’s not too keen on what your agency does. Though of course her main target  _ was _ the President.”

 

Alex purses her lips and a crinkle forms between her eyes.  “Why would she think you were DEO?”

 

“She saw me with you the other night. Apparently you had a run-in with her cousin a year or two ago.”

 

Alex feels both insulted and protective. She hates when anyone is endangered on her account.

 

The Infernian is just regaining consciousness when the DEO detail arrives. They bind her and put her in a paddy wagon, whisking her away as J'onn checks in with Alex and Kara.

 

“Any injuries?”

 

“I’m fine,” Kara says with a cheerful smile that has J'onn rolling his eyes.

 

“Nothing here,” Alex says, downplaying the bruises she can feel blooming under her uniform. “Detective Sawyer’s got some burns and scrapes though.”

 

J'onn turns to Maggie. “Feel like coming back to the DEO?” he asks with amusement. 

 

As though anyone would turn down an opportunity to see inside the DEO.

 

“I  _ suppose _ ,” Maggie says. She’s playful again, and Alex is relieved she doesn’t seem too shaken.

 

They climb in the back of an armored car and sit in silence for a full five minutes before Maggie asks, “How did you find me?”

 

“You’re not the only one with connections. And as you know, abducting a police officer is a  _ federal _ crime. So it was my duty.”

 

Maggie gives her an unimpressed look and Alex caves.

 

“I went back to the bar and asked around.”

 

Maggie smirks. “And by ‘asked’ you mean…”

 

“I may have used a little force. But the bartender was cooperative.”

 

Maggie bobs her head and they ride in silence for another moment.

 

“What’s going to happen to her?”

 

“The bartender? I think she’s still on her shift.”

 

“No, Scorcher.”

 

“Who?”

 

“The Infernian.”

 

“Oh. I’m… not at liberty to say.”

 

Maggie shifts in her seat, still cradling her burnt hand. Alex thinks she knows what’s worrying Maggie.

 

“The DEO doesn’t practice capital punishment, if that’s what you’re asking.”

 

Maggie seems to exhale into the bucket seat, looking smaller and less intimidating than Alex remembers.

 

“She  _ did _ try to kill the President,” Maggie admits. “If anyone deserves it, it’s probably her.”

 

Alex nods and is relieved they can set aside politics as they pull into the DEO garage.

 

Maggie tries to mask her awe as she goes through the screening stations, walking through the body scanner, getting fingerprinted, letting them examine her badge and run a preliminary background check on her. But Alex sees she’s impressed. The DEO is the quite the operation, and watching Maggie’s reaction makes Alex see it with fresh eyes again.

 

But really, it’s an impressive operation.

 

Maggie gives up trying to act cool and starts asking questions. They’re good questions too. Nothing elementary or uninformed. 

 

Alex leads her to the med bay and assures her she’s in good hands, then goes to debrief with J'onn and Kara. 

 

She gives J'onn the full rundown, every detail since she showed up to the signing. She hesitates to mention the bar, not sure Maggie and her friends will appreciate the DEO knowing about their refuge. But it’s a critical piece of the story, and Alex can’t lie to J'onn on a high profile case like this. Even if J’onn couldn’t read minds, it would come back to bite her.

 

J'onn doesn’t bat an eye, but immediately Kara is asking if they can go sometime. Alex placates her, finishing her account of what happened. J'onn raises an eyebrow when Alex adds that Maggie whacked Scorcher over the head with a steel pipe, but doesn’t comment.

 

“Just make sure you actually get her paperwork sorted out this time,” J'onn says, turning to go.

 

It’s as close to an approval as he’s going to give.

 

Alex goes back to check on Maggie, surprised to see her so relaxed and cheerful. She notices the definition in Maggie’s arm muscles and wonders what kind of workout regimen she’s doing.

 

It’s a weird thought, and she quickly overrides it with reassurances that Maggie will be fine. Even though Maggie doesn’t look phased about that. 

 

Maggie is gracious and complimentary, and when she thanks Alex for saving her life, Alex feels like she’s the one who ought to be thanking Maggie. It’s out of her mouth before she realizes what she means, as is so often the case with Alex. 

 

“You did something for me too, you know.”

 

Maggie tilts her head curiously. 

 

“I’ve been hunting aliens for so long that I never really stopped to consider that maybe they weren’t all hostiles to be caged. So thank you.”

 

And Alex means it. Maggie helped open her mind to the possibility of some gray area in the alien community. Because despite what happened with Scorcher, Alex’s recent interactions with aliens haven’t all been bad. The bar was actually kind of cool, and if it weren’t for the cooperation of the bartender, Maggie might be dead. If other aliens besides Kara and J'onn are capable of loyalty to humans, there might be hope for them yet.

 

Maggie returns the compliment, saying she enjoyed working with Alex. It’s qualified with the fact that she prefers to work alone, but it feels like an invitation.

 

Alex is cautious. She’s not sure she’s ready to trust cops. But Maggie doesn’t seem to have any agenda other than the oath she’s taken: protect and serve, aliens included. She’s eager to get out of the DEO and back to that task, apparently.

 

Alex doesn’t want Maggie to go just yet. Working with her to take down Scorcher felt good. Different than any of the missions she’s gone on with fellow DEO agents. She hasn’t put her finger on why yet, and she doesn’t want Maggie to leave before she does. Plus Maggie should really rest and make sure she’s okay. Alex is used to alien combat, but she’s not sure Maggie is. She wants to make sure she doesn’t go into shock or something.

 

She notes Maggie’s urgency. “You got a hot date or something?”

 

It turns out she does. Alex doesn’t know why that surprises her. Obviously people would want to date someone as attractive and confident as Maggie. 

 

Alex finds herself wondering about the woman Maggie’s going to meet. Have they been seeing each other long? Is she as pretty and smart? Who asked who out first? Who pays for things? Question after question stacks up, overwhelming Alex before she dismisses them. She’s supposed to be doing Scorcher’s intake exam and documenting the incident, not contemplating the dating life of someone she just met. 

 

Maggie pulls on her coat, zipping herself back up to go out into the world. 

 

Alex realizes she forgot Maggie’s paperwork. Again. But she doesn’t want to bother her with it now. There’s too much going on, and she doesn’t want to reawaken Maggie’s resistance. 

 

She thinks about that resistance, how stubborn and annoying Maggie seemed at first. But maybe it was just Maggie’s response to Alex’s own insistence that all aliens are bad. 

 

Alex is still cautious. She’s not totally ready to let go of her belief that aliens are  _ mostly _ bad. 

 

But as she watches Maggie walk out of the DEO as though she didn’t just survive an Infernian attack and as confident as if she’d been there a hundred times, Alex feels like a window is open.

  
  



	5. New Orbit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So these chapters overlap from the last. Alex’s starts before where Maggie’s finished last time, if you want to refresh your memory there. I know it’s been way too long between chapters. I’m trying to update regularly, but there was Clexacon and then real life and I’m starting a new job tomorrow. I have no idea when I’ll update again but I’m committed to seeing this story through. I have a lot written for the end of the story so once we get there it should go pretty quick.
> 
> Thanks to everyone who commented and talked with me on Tumblr about this story. Reader engagement really helps keep my motivation up. I like knowing what you like!
> 
> Thanks to @agentmuffin for her feedback on this chapter, and good wishes to my usual beta @youreterriblemuriel while she moves this week. If you find more typos than usual in these chapters, you know why.
> 
> As always be sure to check out Maggie’s chapter after this one. It’s a roller coaster.

Alex is almost disappointed Maggie is so eager to leave the med bay. She isn’t sure what pace Maggie is used to operating at in the NCPD. Certainly not the same pace Alex is used to. But she doesn’t seem to keep still for long.

 

Maybe Alex misjudged her on account of her associates.

 

She goes back to command central to see if J’onn has instructions for her.

 

“You get that paperwork from your friend?” he asks.

 

“My friend?”

 

“The cop. The one with the eyes.” He points his index finger at the corners of his eyes as though Alex is supposed to understand what he means.

 

Alex realizes she never gave Maggie the paperwork she needs. “It’ll be on your desk as soon as I get it back from her.” She doesn’t mention Maggie doesn’t technically have the paperwork to give back yet.

 

Hank nods. “Be sure you review protocol before interrogating our lovely new Infernian detainee.”

 

Alex gives a sharp nod and strides back to the lab to do just that.

 

***

 

Scorcher is easier to handle during questioning than she was in the warehouse. Every time she tries to sneer or raise her voice above normal conversation, her head starts to throb and she winces. Alex wishes she could deal every resistant captive - and let’s be real, they’re all resistant - the same blunt force trauma Maggie dealt Scorcher with the lead pipe.

 

It doesn’t take long to break Scorcher down. She was working alone, her attacks her a form of political protest for the Alien Amnesty Act. It’s pretty cut and dry, as far as Alex is concerned. As soon as it’s over, she gets the urge to text Maggie and thank her again for her help. She’d expected to be there all night trying to get information out of the Infernian, but it’s not even ten and she’s done for the day. She prints out the ream of paperwork she needs Maggie to fill out, then hops on her bike to go home. Only when she’s back in her apartment does she send a text, realizing too late she’s probably interrupting Maggie’s date.

 

_Thanks so much for your help tonight. You really saved us._

 

Alex is surprised when the √√ _Read_ notification pops up seconds later.

 

Maggie doesn’t reply, and Alex feels like Maggie’s waiting for her to say something. Luckily she remembers the paperwork.

 

_I’ve still got that pesky paperwork for you. How can I get it to you?_

 

Maggie replies this time. _i_ _can come get it now. send me the address_

 

Alex hadn’t meant to make her go out of her way. Certainly not if she was on a date.

 

_I thought you had a date._

 

Alex realizes it sounds accusatory. She should have sent a winking emoji or something. Kara is always telling her how useful they are in conveying tone, but Alex never texts anyone but Kara and sometimes Winn, and they know her well enough to understand what she means without extraneous characters.

 

Besides, she probably shouldn’t send a winking emoji to an NCPD officer. It’s unprofessional.

 

But Alex sure wishes there were some indication of tone in Maggie’s reply.

 

_just send me the address_

 

If she’s annoyed, it’s probably justified. No one likes paperwork and Alex is about to dump a ton of it on her. All Maggie did was help them, and it’s a bummer she has to spend hours on paperwork now.

 

Sure enough, Maggie is visibly annoyed by the time she arrives to collect the blank documents from Alex’s apartment. She’s downright surly. Alex tries not to take it personally, but it’s a stark contrast to Maggie’s cheerful demeanor earlier. She wonders if something happened or if Maggie really despises paperwork that much.

 

Maybe the awe of seeing the inside of the DEO has worn off and Maggie remembers she’s at odds with the DEO’s mission and methods. It was clear to Alex that Maggie hates what she does and how she does it. Alex isn’t used to that kind of outright disapproval.

 

But Maggie seemed more relaxed earlier. It doesn’t make sense.

 

Whatever it is, Alex is surprised she loses even a minute of sleep over it.

 

***

 

The call she gets a few days later eases her discomfort. She’s distracted dealing with the Daxamite, so seeing _Sawyer_ on her caller ID doesn’t bring the eagerness it would have if she’d fully registered who was calling.

 

“Danvers,” she says.

 

“It’s Sawyer. Wanna see a dead body?”

 

It’s an absurd line and Alex holds back a chuckle.

 

“Depends whose it is.”

 

Maggie lets out a half laugh. “We found an unknown species in an abandoned car in the warehouse district. Figured you might know something.”

 

Alex bristles at the accusation.

 

“The DEO doesn’t practice capital punishment,” Alex says. She’s certain she told Maggie that before. “And we certainly wouldn’t dump a deceased inmate in the warehouse district.”

 

“That’s not what I meant,” Maggie says. “I’m calling to ask for your _help_ , Danvers.”

 

Alex brightens, then apologizes. “ _Oh_. Sorry. I just thought… Nevermind what I thought. Send me the location.”

 

Maggie gives a little grunt of, “K,” and they hang up.

 

Alex feels good that Maggie asked her to help. She’s energetic and focused. She tucks her phone in her belt and tells J’onn she’s going on a field visit. He frowns and she holds up a hand and gives a vague shake of her head, indicating it’s nothing important and she’ll explain later if it’s even necessary.

 

“Can I come?” Kara asks, bouncing on her heels and reminding Alex of the annoying little girl she’d been when she first came to Earth.

 

Alex feels guilty for ever being annoyed with that poor orphaned girl and nods reflexively.

 

“I’m gonna drive,” she stipulates though.

 

“Cool. I’ll fly.”

 

Alex grabs a forensics collection kit and takes an armored car, speeding toward the coordinates Maggie gave her.

 

Maggie’s all business as she hands Alex a pair of gloves and gives Alex the rundown: they got a call from a civilian whose dog had been barking at an abandoned car relentlessly. Upon opening it, they’d found an alien in a tarp, looking pretty bad for the wear and for baking in a car for however long he’d been there.

 

Kara lands with a whoosh behind them, listening in as Maggie relays her preliminary assessments; she’s looked for trauma, a weapon, typical signs of resistance or attempts to get help. She’s already catalogued things it would have taken Alex a while to record in the lab.

 

Alex does spot one thing though: the weapon, lodged firmly in the victim’s chest like a stake. She pulls it out, knowing immediately it’s an alien horn rather than petrified wood or some kind of carved weapon.

 

She frowns, listening as Kara relays confusion. The victim is Sybillian, a species known for their pacifism. Alex and Maggie offer possible explanations, none of which seem quite right. They need more information than can be gleaned frowning into the trunk.

 

Wanted to feel like she’s still got an edge despite Maggie’s thorough preliminary assessment, Alex offers to analyze the weapon in the DEO lab. Maggie smiles, and Alex realizes that’s why Maggie called her. Not because she values what Alex does, but because Alex’s technology is useful. It’s a disappointment, but she shrugs it off. She’d do the same if she were in Maggie’s shoes.

 

It’s a quick analysis. Within minutes she knows the genus, species, blood type, and relative age of the attacker. She debates pursuing the assailant herself, but it’s Maggie’s case, and she knows how annoying it is when someone comes in and takes over. Plus a single dead Sybillian isn’t the biggest fish to catch. Not when there’s a string of missing aliens Alex should be looking into.

 

So she calls Maggie, who says she’ll use her connections to find the guy. She hangs up, and Alex feels a little used, but at least it’s for the right reasons.

 

Maggie calls back a few hours later saying she knows where to find the guy.

 

“Nice,” Alex says. Her tone is flat though. She can’t fake enthusiasm.

 

“Wanna come?”

 

Alex forgives Maggie’s blatant use of DEO technology in heartbeat. Nothing she’s working on at the moment is urgent. Maggie has good ties to information, and the playful way she asked makes Alex more excited than she should be about a murder. So she hops on her bike and meets Maggie, in plainclothes again, outside what appears to be a gym.

 

Maggie doesn’t bother with a greeting. “So this guy, Quill, seems to be mixed up in something we think is related to all those missing aliens as well as the homicide,” she says, voice low but solid. “I’m thinking he’s got a lot to say. If we can get him to talk.”

 

“What do you want from me?” Alex asks, cooperative and eager.

 

“Just follow my lead.”

 

Alex nods as a muscled guy with curly hair walks out of the gym, shoulders hunched under his bag. Maggie slides up to him, casual but firm, and shows him her badge.

 

It only takes a moment for him to lash out. Maggie and Alex draw their guns lightning-fast, but Quill is faster, knocking their weapons out of their hands and taking off.

 

They pursue him and take him down like it was choreographed. Alex has never felt so in sync with someone during a fight. Sure, she has people at the DEO who can fight at her level. But a cop? Who somehow intuits what she’s about to do and reinforces it, allowing them to take down an alien in a matter of seconds? It’s unexpected and thrilling.

 

Maggie reaches for her cuffs and barks that he’s under arrest, and for a second it feels like they’ve been doing this together for years.

 

But then Maggie seizes and yells and falls to the ground, unconscious, and Alex is caught in something that prevents her from moving toward Maggie. She barely registers the taser and the men hauling Quill into a van as he screams for help.

 

The van skids away as Alex scrambles out of the weighted net and leaps toward Maggie, checking her vitals. She glances up, squinting at the van to see if she can get any part of the plate number. Of course, it’s been removed.

 

Maggie lays there unconscious for a few seconds and the quiet that creeps in feels heavy and foreboding. Alex prods her, willing her to regain consciousness. Alex starts to panic, worried Maggie suffered head trauma or is starting to bleed internally.

 

But Maggie wakes up, wincing and blinking a few times as Alex hovers over her. Alex is so relieved, she lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding.

 

Before Maggie can speak, Alex is asking her questions. The date, who the president is, how many fingers she’s holding up.

 

Maggie coughs and says, “I didn’t know you were a doctor.”

 

Alex pulls her lips into her mouth for a second and lowers her hand. “I almost was.”

 

There’s a pause as Maggie lays there on the pavement looking up at her in confusion. “Seriously?”

 

Alex nods, looking everywhere but at Maggie. “I dropped out of Stanford to join the DEO.”

 

She looks back down to see an expression on Maggie’s face that looks almost impressed. “Well, aren’t you full of surprises.”

 

Alex shrugs out of the compliment. “Too bad I can’t anticipate one. Do you remember what happened?”

 

“I got tazed,” Maggie says, sitting up and wincing again. “ _Fuck_ , I’ll never get used to that.”

 

“I think that’s the point.”

 

Maggie leans forward with her legs outstretched, body creaking and groaning. It’s startling, how she went from an agile partner in taking down Quill to an arthritic.

 

“I’ll get us a car,” Alex offers, pulling out her phone.

 

“You don’t have to do that,” Maggie says, shifting to work out some tension in her back.

 

“I don’t want you riding home.”

 

“I’m fine,” Maggie insists, forcing herself onto her feet, leaving Alex crouching on the ground. “Not the worst I’ve been dealt in a fight.”

 

Alex stares up at her, wondering what Maggie’s referring to. But she doesn’t have time to ask, because Maggie’s heading toward her bike, working the stiffness out of her legs with each step.

 

“Wait, wait,” Alex calls after her. “That’s it?”

 

Maggie looks back at her, forehead crinkled. “What do you mean?”

 

“You’re just gonna leave?”

 

Maggie looks at her like she’s an idiot. “No… I’m going inside.” She gestures toward the gym.

 

She pauses, an expectant expression on her face that indicates Alex should follow.

 

Alex doesn’t know if she should be impressed at Maggie’s determination or appalled by her seeming lack of regard for her own well-being. She watches Maggie’s slight frame carefully for signs of injury or fragility as they walk into the gym. She seems to be doing okay, though she’s more tentative in her steps and gestures.

 

Inside is a shitty excuse for a gym: torn wrestling mats and rusty equipment and flickering fluorescent lights. Maggie tries to play it cool and chat people up, but they’re not having it. All they get are some mutters and leers. Not even the guy at the desk is willing to talk, and in plainclothes without a warrant they’re not going to get anything.

 

Maggie walks out, only a little stiffer than usual.

 

“So now what?” Alex asks.

 

“You tell _me_ ,” Maggie says. There’s an edge of annoyance in her voice, but Alex knows it isn’t about her this time.

 

“It’s your case,” Alex says. “You seem to have methods that work.”

 

Maggie sighs, defeated. “Sometimes my methods involve a good night’s sleep and hitting the pavement in the morning.”

 

Alex nods, understanding that feeling too well.

 

Alex nods down Maggie’s body and the residual stiffness from the taser. “You should really get checked out.”

 

“You don’t think those beefcakes in there did the job?”

 

Alex gives a half-hearted chuckle. “I know you’re dying to come back to the DEO.”

 

Maggie glances around the street as though she’s anxious to leave.

 

“I’m fine. Promise.”

 

There’s an awkward silence and Alex feels something twist in her stomach.

 

“Wanna grab something to eat?”

 

Maggie flashes her a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “I should get back to my girlfriend. But another time?”

 

Alex bites her lips and nods. Hopefully Maggie’s girlfriend will take care of her. If Maggie even tells her about the taser, that is. Which she probably won’t because she’s stubbornly insistent that she’s fine.

 

“Okay. Well, when you have a minute, don’t forget that paperwork,” Alex says.

 

Maggie lifts her eyebrows in annoyance, still looking around the street. “Hard to forget the ream of paper on my desk.”

 

“It goes quick,” Alex lies.

 

Maggie shoots her a skeptical look.

 

“You okay to ride?” Alex asks, nodding toward Maggie’s bike.

 

“Yup.” Maggie turns, quick to end the conversation, and Alex wonders if she said something wrong. “Thanks for having my back.”

 

“Of course. Thanks for inviting me.”

 

Maggie walks quickly to her bike and swings her leg over with only a little struggle. She pulls her helmet on and the bike roars to life before Alex turns toward her own, thinking she might head back to work for a bit and get a head start on tomorrow’s work of testing the Daxamite’s powers.

 

***

 

Maggie calls her the next day, smug as she says she got a tip. Alex is about to ask how, but doesn’t want to sound too impressed. “That was fast,” is plenty to stroke Maggie’s ego.

 

“Texting you the location. Oh- and I almost forgot. Wear something nice.”

 

Maggie hangs up before Alex can ask her to clarify, so she texts.

 

_Nice?_

 

_cocktail attire_

 

Alex frowns, wondering how she’s going to get home to change in time to meet Maggie. Then she remembers the DEO has a locker full of clothes for undercover missions. She weeds through it, finding a blue dress that fits her marginally well. It’s nothing amazing, but it’ll do the job. She’s not going there to turn heads.

 

She feels awkward in the dress. It fits her fine. But she doesn’t have her full range of motion, can’t break into a run if she needs to. That and she doesn’t have a place to conceal a weapon. That’s probably the most uncomfortable aspect.

 

She takes an armored car to the coordinates Maggie sends her. She’s curious what Maggie has in store for her. Maggie’s good at what she does, but she’s gotten herself into some bad situations in the last week. At the last second she shoots Kara a text letting her know what’s up and telling her to keep an ear out.

 

She feels underdressed when she sees Maggie with her hair and makeup done elegantly. She wonders if she should have put in more effort besides rooting through the DEO lockers. But Maggie assures her she looks fine, hands her a mask, and takes her hand to lead her toward an unassuming entrance.

 

It’s a little weird to be holding Maggie’s hand, but also somewhat comforting. Alex thinks about something J’onn said the other day about the egoless culture of Mars, how the citizens shared minds with a touch. She can’t read Maggie’s mind, but there’s a camaraderie and encouragement to it that Alex likes. That and she feels protected from the attentions of men with money and ego and a thin layer of charm to cover the nothingness underneath.

 

Alex wonders if her hand is tingling because she’s excited about going undercover or because she’s not used to having it held.

 

The setup of the room inside is curious. It’s large with a high ceiling, dressed up for the occasion with tables and carpets. In the center is some sort of arena, perhaps for a circus act or wrestling.

 

It doesn’t take too long to find out. A serpentine woman slinks through the crowd, building up to the announcement of fights.

 

For the first time in her life, Alex sees aliens as victims.

 

Alex hears people betting all around her, and as soon as she spots Quill and M’gann, she remembers how terrible the world is. The cheering and betting around her amplify her anxiety. Beside her she can feel Maggie tense and mutter, “I really wish I’d called for backup.”

 

Alex is as grateful as ever to have Kara for a sister. She arrives just in time, dropping into the arena. But just as she does, Roulette unleashes Bravak, who is truly the most terrifying alien Alex has ever seen. Logically she knows her sister is invulnerable, but she doesn’t think Kara can hold him off for long.

 

She has to get Kara out. She needs to get everyone out.

 

Alex clutches the edge of the table as Kara fights and slams the call button on her com over and over, willing the DEO to respond as soon as possible. She has no gun, no weapons, not even her ID with her.

 

She feels completely helpless and scared.

 

Maggie indicates they need to take out the guard. It’s not a word or a signal, just a look that Alex understands. Alex stomps her heel on his foot, kneeing him in the groin as Maggie elbows his face. It’s good to have something to hit. Maggie grabs his gun and fires warning shots into the air, dispersing the crowd. Alex grabs his other gun and fires at the electronic device sealing the cage, deactivating it.

 

Kara is on the ground, totally still, and Alex rushes to her, terrified. She can’t believe she got Kara into this situation.

 

Kara groans and tries to sit up, coughing as she forces air into her lungs. Alex feels relief flood through her like oxygen when Kara jokes, “Hope too many people didn’t bet on me.”

 

The DEO team arrives shortly, and they wrangle up the guy Maggie managed to detain without cuffs or a weapon. In all the shuffle she loses track of her and wonders where she went.

 

***

 

Maggie reaches out to her the following day with exactly the news Alex wants to hear. Other than Roulette being caught, that is.

  


_i’ve got that novel you asked me to write. not sure it’s a bestseller but it’s done_

  


_Great. I’ll send a car to pick it up._

  


_i can bring it by_ , Maggie offers. _plus I wanted to cross-check our reports on last night_

  


_Sure_ , Alex responds. _I’m training til 7, but after?_

  


_just let me know_

  


Of course, Alex gets distracted searching for Hank, who went missing shortly after she and Kara told him about M’gann being part of the fights. She’s not too worried, since it hasn’t been too long. Still, she gets caught up in something and it’s ten by the time she thinks to send Maggie a message. She feels terrible. Not only did they not get to debrief the night before, she’s been rude to someone she enjoys working with.

  


_Sorry, totally lost track of time. You still want to meet?_

  


Maggie writes back immediately. _i needed a few hours to talk to my sources anyway. food?_

 

Alex is surprised. After Maggie turned her down the other night she didn’t think Maggie wanted to be friendly. She’s happy she was wrong.

 

_Sure._

 

Maggie texts her an address and Alex speeds there on her bike, report tucked into her jacket.

 

The restaurant is an average greasy spoon serving burgers and shakes and breakfast food around the clock. After the Roulette affair last night, Alex is relieved to go somewhere more casual. She doesn’t think crostini and mini quiches will sate her.

 

Alex sits down and props up her menu. Maggie walks in a few minutes later, hitches her chin and gives her a big smile. She saunters over, swinging down into the booth and tucking her helmet against the wall, throwing the weighty envelope of her paperwork so it lands with a dramatic plop next to Alex’s menu.

 

“How’s it going?”

 

“I could eat a horse,” Alex says. “You?”

 

“At least a miniature one,” Maggie responds.

 

“You get any sleep last night?”

 

Maggie’s eyes flare and she lets out a fatigued breath. “Pretty sure if I opened a vein right now you’d get nothing but coffee.”

 

“They’ve got more here if you need it.”

 

Maggie props up her menu and scans it for a minute before slapping it back down on the table.

 

“How are you feeling?” Alex asks, leaning forward.

 

“Fine."

 

"Are you sure?"

 

"Why wouldn’t I be?”

 

“Um, you got tazed last night.

 

Maggie chuckles and says, “Oh, right. Totally fine. I’ve had much worse.”

 

Alex wonders if Maggie comes into as much contact with hostile aliens as she does.

 

“I get that,” Alex says good-naturedly. “Pretty sure if someone saw me naked they’d ask if everything is okay at home.”

 

Maggie shoots her a confused smile and Alex realizes it was a weird thing to say.

 

“I have a lot of scars and bruises,” Alex explains. “You know, like how a doctor is supposed to ask you… Nevermind.”

 

Maggie hitches her chin in understanding, then rolls up her sleeve to show Alex a sun-shaped scar too symmetrical to be accidental.

 

“Infernian burn,” Maggie says. “And that’s just one of a dozen.”

 

They smile at each other for a second before Alex asks her what she’s having.

 

“I know it’s all starch and corn syrup, but a big stack of pancakes with butter and a side of hash browns sounds like heaven right now.”

 

Alex nods and decides she’ll have the same.

 

They order and hand their menus over. Then a dreaded lull in the conversation settles between them.

 

“So last night was a trip,” Alex says.

 

Maggie sighs and looks dejected.

 

“We’ll get her,” Alex assures Maggie. It feels foreign to be the one doing the comforting after a failed mission. Usually that’s Kara’s job. But right now Alex feels compelled to do it.

 

“Hope so,” Maggie says. She looks even more glum, and Alex wonders about it.

 

“Everything else okay?”

 

“Oh… yeah, it’ll be fine.”

 

Alex is feeling nosy. “What’ll be fine?”

 

Maggie swats the air to dismiss Alex’s concern.

 

“No, tell me.”

 

“My girlfriend laid into me this morning because I bailed on her last night. It was just a bad way to start the day.”

 

“Ah,” Alex says.

 

“It happens a lot. I get held up, she feels stood up, I have to make up for it…”

 

“Didn’t you say she’s an EMT? You’d think she’d be more understanding.”

 

“You’d _think_. But she works shifts, and the most she ever gets held over is an hour or so.”

 

Alex nods, wishing she understood the kind of obligation Maggie feels for her girlfriend. She’s never felt beholden to anyone but Kara, but she offers what she can.

 

“It’s tricky business, catching aliens.”

 

Maggie quirks an eyebrow. “I’m not always out to catch them.”

 

“Right,” Alex says, apologetic. “Sorry. Old habits.”

 

Maggie lets the comment go. “What about you, you get any sleep?”

 

“Yeah, once I was sure Kara was home safe.”

 

“Kara…?”

 

“My sister,” Alex says, realizing she came close to saying too much. “I worry about her.”

 

“Is she okay?”

 

“Yeah, yeah. She’s fine. Just… absurdly trusting and naive.”

 

“She live nearby?”

 

Alex nods and takes a sip of coffee, hoping her face isn’t betraying how close she came to revealing Kara’s secret.

 

“Well, this town will take care of her naiveté in about five minutes.”

 

Alex swallows and raises her eyebrows, wondering if anything will put a dent in Kara’s steely cheer and stubborn belief that everyone has some iota of good inside them.

 

“You get a load of that Kryptonian that went bar hopping the other night?” Maggie asks, changing gears. “I heard he tried to arm-wrestle a few douchey frat boys who didn’t realize what they were signing up for.”

 

Alex settles into her seat with a fatigued chuckle, relaying the real version of the story. She doesn’t usually talk about internal affairs with outsiders, but Maggie is a trusted entity, and the diner is all but deserted.

 

Their food arrives and they dig in, ravenous. Between bites, Alex asks Maggie how long she’s been in National City, and before long they’re sharing war stories about their strangest encounters with aliens and humans alike. Unlike other law enforcement professionals Alex has interacted with, it doesn’t feel like a competition. There’s knowing laughter and commiserative eyerolling and even a few helpful tips shared between them. Their plates are long empty and they’re on their third cup of coffee as Alex tells the story of Supergirl saving her plane.

 

“So I guess she’s rescued both of us.”

 

“Um, I recall you being the one to cut me down.”

 

Alex looks around the diner, shrugging off Maggie’s compliment. “Couldn’t have done it without Supergirl.”

 

Maggie drops the playful banter. “In my experience, when something goes right, it’s because of the people behind the scenes. When I was on the beat, it was all about clear communication with the dispatcher and commanding officer. I talk a big game about working alone, but I rely on a lot of people. And I know Supergirl relies on you.”

 

Alex shifts, easing into the praise. She wasn’t expecting it from Maggie. It feels heavy, and yet she’s floating, spinning a little lighter and more joyfully than usually.

 

“How’d you start working together, anyway?” Maggie asks. There’s something gleeful in her voice, like she’s been waiting to ask this question, and for a moment, Alex panics, thinking she’s figured it out.

 

“She was recruited just like I was. Except I didn’t save any planes before I started training.”

 

“Yeah, I’m guessing that’s an atypical credential, even for the DEO.”

 

Alex nods, trying to compose herself so she doesn’t give much away.

 

“How’d _you_ get recruited? If you don’t mind me asking.”

 

Alex screws up her mouth, wondering how much she should tell Maggie. She can’t tell her about Kara, of course. She could give her the party line that her research attracted the government’s attention. But Alex decides to offer a bit of truth.

 

“I was studying advanced bioengineering at Stanford. But you’d have thought I was writing a dissertation of the effects of tequila on the human body and using myself as a case study. One night Agent Henshaw picked me up and offered me a job, on the condition that I clean up my act.”

 

Maggie looks surprised, and Alex worries she’s said too much.

 

“Does that surprise you?”

 

“I guess not,” Maggie says. “I just imagined you as disciplined and bookish.”

 

“I was,” Alex says. “Until I wasn’t.”

 

“So are you okay…?”

 

“What? Oh, yeah, yeah. There’s this thing called moderation and it’s _fantastic_.”

 

Maggie smiles and gives a little nod. “Glad to hear it.”

 

Alex swallows, surprised at how personal the conversation has gotten.

 

“What about you?”

 

“I have a beer or two now and then. The hard stuff once in a while, but not too often.”

 

Alex feels silly for asking the wrong question. “No, I mean how’d you end up with a badge?”

 

“ _Oh_ ,” Maggie smiles. “When I was a kid an officer really helped me and my little brother once. A few years later I got to shadow her for a school assignment. She was everything a cop should be. Smart, patient, tough. I wanted to be like her.”

 

“A smart cop…” Alex says, pretending to be confused.

 

“Hey now,” Maggie grins back. “We’re not all idiots.”

 

“ _You’re_ not. The rest are pending investigation.”

 

Maggie rolls her eyes over a smile and finishes her coffee. They sit in silence for a moment, and Alex feels the impending goodbye.

 

She doesn’t want it to come. She likes the orbit she’s in, just her and Maggie.

 

But of course, it has to change eventually.

 

“Speaking of investigations,” Maggie says. “I should call it a night so I can continue working on ours in the morning.”

 

Alex likes that Maggie is sharing the Roulette case with her. It’s a good feeling.

 

She looks at her watch and blinks. “Yeah, I should try to get some sleep.”

 

“We didn’t go over our reports,” Maggie points out.

 

Alex pulls hers out, checking over her shoulder to make sure they’re still the only people in their section of the diner. She unfolds the papers and lays them on the table, a peace offering between their often conflicting agencies.

 

Maggie looks up, pleasantly surprised Alex actually brought paperwork for her to see, then lets her eyes skim over the paragraphs Alex has meticulously typed out. When she finishes, she smiles.

 

“I wish people in my department would write reports like this.”

 

“We’re not just a bunker full of shiny toys and big guns,” Alex says.

 

“Apparently not.” She looks over the report again. “I’m still not sure how I’m going to explain why you were there. My sergeant probably wouldn’t be too keen on me inviting the ‘Secret Service’ on an undercover mission.”

 

“Just say I had intel, that I was already on the scene. You don’t have to say you gave me the intel.”

 

Maggie grins, a little lopsided.

 

She sits up straighter, as though to leave, and though Alex is exhausted and there’s no reason for them to stay, she wishes they could.

 

Maggie may be just a local cop, but she’s exceeded Alex’s expectations at every opportunity. Alex would never admit it, but Maggie’s outshone _her_ in the last few weeks, without any of the databases and analytics Alex relies on.

 

She suddenly has to know Maggie’s methods.

 

“How do you do it?” she asks.

 

“Do what?”

 

Alex lifts her hands, not sure what exactly she means.

 

“Get all your information. Figure stuff out before we do.”

 

Maggie’s grin turns smug and she leans close over the table, lowering her voice. “It’s highly advanced technology.”

 

Alex leans forward, intrigued. Maggie pauses for a second and Alex feels fidgety.

 

“I use my ears and my brain. I ask the right questions of the right people.”

 

“That’s it?”

 

“That’s it,” Maggie says with a satisfied grin.

 

Alex almost can’t believe it, but she’s seen Maggie in action. She’s not faking anything.

 

Alex feels a swell of admiration and jealousy.

 

There’s a pause before Maggie sits back and adds with a shrug, “I also have a Master’s degree in forensic psychology and nine years of advanced professional training. But you know. Mostly listening.” She winks and Alex feels a shiver of either annoyance or amusement.

 

“Is that all,” Alex says, trying to play it cool.

 

“Yeah, that’s all,” Maggie says, reaching for her helmet. “Nice chatting with you, Danvers. We should do it again sometime.”

 

Maybe it’s the late hour or the too-white lights of the diner, but Alex doesn’t think Maggie actually means it. She’s just being polite. She doesn’t know what it means to Alex to have someone besides Kara to talk to.

 

Still, she hopes she’s wrong and that they’ll hang out again soon.


	6. Implosion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter references three girls from Alex’s backstory as written in the first three chapters of this fic. You don’t have to go back and reread, but it’s been a few months since those were posted, so to refresh: Vicky Donahue is my imagining of the girl named in canon, Natalie is a girl Alex had a strange pot-based friendship with in med school, and Priya is a DEO recruit Alex was in charge of training who didn’t make full agent. 
> 
> Thanks to @youreterriblemuriel and @agentmuffin for their fine beta skills.

Alex would be lying if she said she isn’t tempted to read Maggie’s paperwork. It’s heavy in her hands and in her mind as she leaves the diner and goes home. She wants to know more about Maggie, wants to know what else prompted her to join the police force, wants to know what kind of aliens she’s dated.

But it would be crossing a boundary to read Maggie’s file. Especially when she told Maggie she wouldn’t.

But maybe just the first page would be okay.

Maggie’s full name is Margaret Ellen Sawyer. She’s thirty-one, she’s never been married, she has no children, her parents are divorced, she has a little brother and a half sister, two degrees in Forensic Psychology and a certificate in Criminology, has no arrest record, no contact with foreign nationals, and has been steadily employed with the NCPD since 2008.

So maybe Alex reads the first five pages.

She wants to keep reading, but she doesn’t.

She redirects her curiosity to Roulette and the absurd fight club Maggie uncovered. She enlists Kara to help her determine when and where the next event will be held, and before she knows it she’s calling Maggie to tell her when the bust will happen. She doesn’t even hesitate to include her.

Alex knows J’onn would object to partnering with local law enforcement after their last disaster with Detective Draper. But J’onn is missing, so Alex is acting deputy director again, and she calls the shots. She doesn’t even have to set aside her pride to ask for Maggie’s help. She’s glad to be able to call on Maggie again.

It’s a strange feeling, to trust someone besides Kara and J’onn. But Maggie hasn’t tripped any of Alex’s internal sensors. She just knows Maggie can be trusted, and they’re going to need Maggie’s help if they plan to take on a whole fight club full of aliens. Plus it’s kind of Maggie’s bust. She figured out what was going on and where the first event was being held. Alex might even go as far as to say she’s a good detective.

She even lets Maggie make the arrest. Since Roulette isn’t a metahuman, the DEO can’t lock her up anyway.

It’s a winning night all around. J’onn is safely recovered, Roulette is taken into custody, Kara talks the aliens out of whatever flimsy loyalty they felt for Roulette, and no one is injured except J’onn, who will be okay in a few days. Once she’s sure of that, she races to the NCPD to congratulate Maggie on a bust well executed.

Only when she gets there Maggie’s in a mood. She uncuffs Roulette on the street corner and explains - or doesn’t really - that the higher-ups have ordered Roulette’s release. Alex is as dumbstruck as Maggie. She isn’t sure what to do now. She tries to bolster Maggie with a compliment.

She offers to buy Maggie a drink to further soothe her. Only Maggie has plans, and those plans include a girl who approaches out of nowhere. Maggie kisses her and Alex feels herself tense. Not because it’s wrong or weird or anything. Just because she wasn’t expecting it and it seems kind of private. Or maybe it isn’t. It’s just a peck. But Alex wishes she’d been given enough warning to glance away.

Maggie offers a raincheck and Alex feels a withering sense that it’s a hollow offer. Maybe their meal in the diner was just a one time thing, and Maggie isn’t really interested in being friends.

Alex draws in a breath, standing taller, walking back to her bike with stiff shoulders, shaky with the reminder that she doesn’t know how to make or keep friends. She never has, and maybe she never will. That’s why she throws herself into her work. That’s why her closest friend is her sister, who is bound to her by secrets and an unearthly loyalty and insistence on seeing the good in her.

Or maybe Maggie’s rejection is karmic retribution for reading Maggie’s file. Except Alex doesn’t believe in karma.

Whatever the reason, Maggie’s rejection feels like punishment for something she can’t name.

She doesn’t have to feel that way for long though, because Maggie invites her to play pool the next day. They play a round, and Alex starts to feel better. They talk about work, but they also talk about all the interesting places they’ve been. Maggie tells her a little about Nebraska and how she’s glad to not be there. In turn Alex talks about Midvale and Stanford and asks for Maggie’s insight on a few species she’s interested in studying. She feels like she’s figuring out how to be a friend to someone besides Kara. She feels light. Maybe this was the feeling she was chasing all those nights when she drank herself into oblivion.

Maggie can keep up with her mental parkour and makes it look easy. Alex

finds herself strategizing between their games, angling cues and friendly taunts simultaneously. She thinks about Maggie’s amused reactions, the way she laughs at things Alex thought were serious. She’s even more at ease in the face of stress than Natalie, and apart from a few drinks here and there, her calmness doesn’t come from a joint or a shot or a pill. Alex can’t figure her out. She’s an equation Alex can’t solve. And because there are very few equations Alex can’t figure out, she obsesses over it, hoping her secret will reveal itself.

But the more time they spend together, the more certain Alex is that Maggie is just Maggie. There’s no chemical compound or external force that makes her the way she is. And at every juncture Maggie proves herself even smarter and tougher and more agreeable than before.

Alex would feel threatened if she didn’t admire her so much.

Alex remembers when she used to socialize. Maggie makes her remember. She remembers Fun Alex from med school, and though she has no desire to go back to that kind of chaos, she misses the spontaneity of it. So she tries to return to that playful version of herself, and when she wins a game, she snatches her winnings from the table.

But then Maggie admits she was just dumped, and Alex feels something shift in her chest. It’s so unexpected, so nonsensical and strange. She can’t believe someone would dump Maggie. She’s suddenly so worried about her, confused by how nonchalant she seems. But Alex sees the crumpling underneath in the way Maggie avoids eye contact and moves toward the bar. Alex wants to try to smooth it out for Maggie, but Maggie resists, and Alex can’t blame her. Alex is pretty sure she wouldn’t want to be around people if she’d been dumped.

Still, Alex worries about her. She worries about her a lot. She even wakes up in the middle of the night wondering if she should text her and make sure she’s okay. Maggie’s an adult, she can handle herself. But if she’s drinking and upset, maybe Alex’s worry is warranted.

Alex doesn’t want to seem too eager, too desperate for Maggie’s friendship. That’s sure to kill it off. She knows she’s impatient by nature and doesn’t want to weird Maggie out. Still, she can’t stop herself from texting Maggie the next morning to check in.

_survive the night?_

It’s a while before Maggie responds. _Ha, yes._

_let me know if i need to punch anyone for making your life harder_

_Punching my boss is a felony_

There’s a long, strange pause in the conversation and Alex doesn’t know how to take Maggie’s text. Is it her usual dry humor? Or is she still out of sorts.

Luckily the answer comes through in the next text Maggie sends.

_pool again soon?_

Alex grins, relieved.

_Sure_

She smiles and tucks her phone away.

She realizes too late Winn is trying to get her attention. She apologizes and explains she’s worried about her friend. When Winn makes a snarky comment about not meddling in other people’s relationships, Alex snips back playfully.

Winn laughs it off.

“It’s not like you’re into this Maggie person.”

Alex chuckles to cover her curiosity over why he’d even phrase it like that. He’s a strange person. She wouldn’t admit it out loud, but it’s been nice having him around. He appreciates her wit in a way Kara never did - at first it was a language barrier thing, now it’s just a Kara barrier thing - and they get along.

And it’s true, she’s not into Maggie like that. But she understands why someone inclined would be. Maggie is beautiful and ambitious and tough and funny. Alex really hopes they can keep hanging out.

Alex is tempted to read Maggie’s file again to see if she can dig up anything about her ex that will make Maggie feel better. If she can prove that girl was undeserving or had a history of psychiatric hospitalization or something, maybe Maggie won’t take what the girl said too much to heart.

But Alex has already looked into Maggie’s file once and doesn’t want to make a habit of it. She told Maggie she wouldn’t.

As luck would have it, a case that afternoon lands her at the same crime scene as Maggie. She’s concerned when she sees the set of Maggie’s brow and the visible fatigue clinging to her under her windbreaker. She tries to poke at it, to see if it will spook away and return Maggie to her previous cheerful self.

But then Alex makes a fatal mistake, inviting Maggie to hang out. It’s nothing she hasn’t done before, but Maggie detects a bit of desperation or fascination or hunger that Alex failed to conceal.

Maggie cocks her head, looking at her as though she sees through every stitch of clothing Alex is wearing, and says, “I didn’t know you were into girls.”

It’s so matter-of-fact, Alex can’t even form a response for a second. She gapes, then seals herself like a vault, metal locks clanking shut with force, assuring Maggie she is _not._

Internally, she starts to combust.

Maggie _knows_ something. Something about Vicky and Natalie and Priya and all the boys who didn’t work out for one reason or another.

Alex bolts, rushing back to her apartment, not even bothering to finish her paperwork for J’onn. She can’t think about work right now, which is perhaps the strangest thing that’s happened to her in the last ten years. Agent Danvers can’t think about _work_.

She pours herself a stiff drink, knowing it’s probably not a good idea. She promises herself she won’t have more than two.

She has four.

She lays on the floor of her living room, looking up at the ceiling, thinking about all the ceilings she’s stared at like this before.

The Donahue’s ceiling as Vickie slept next to her.

The ceiling of Natalie’s apartment as she lay on the couch stoned.

The ceiling of the sparring room where she trained Priya.

The ceiling of the universe, spread out before her in constellations of galaxies she thought she’d be able to understand.

Maybe all her spinning and fixation on looking up was to keep herself from looking in. Maybe she’s transparent and everyone around her can see. Maybe Maggie is the first person with enough heart to tell her what she should have known all along.

Is Maggie right? Did Alex want more from Vickie and Natalie and Priya than she’d realized?

She thinks about the soft, pink skin of Vickie’s shoulder, its orangey freckles fascinating in the early morning light. She thinks of how she’d felt when Vickie did her makeup for her: blue eyeshadow and too-brown blush and maroon lipstick. Alex had sat perfectly still, feeling so small and dainty and feminine as the brushes grazed her skin and the waxy, chalky lipstick was dragged over her lips. Vickie’s lips had touched the same color, and Alex always felt a tingling, like it was some sort of bond they shared as best friends.

But maybe- maybe that isn’t how best friends feel about sharing lipstick. Maybe other girls didn’t lay awake staring at their friend’s shoulders and trying to name the color of their freckles.

And Natalie -- maybe she’d thought the soft, hazy sensation came from the joint when it was really Natalie herself. Maybe that’s why she hadn’t liked smoking after Natalie dropped out.

And maybe her instant dislike for Priya had nothing to do with Priya herself. Maybe she’d driven off a perfectly capable agent out of fear of what she would evoke.

Maybe all those years of getting high and drinking and dancing had been about chasing away the feeling of being attracted to a girl. Or maybe she’d been trying to recreate the high of it. Either way, it hadn’t worked, because here she is, twenty-eight years old and questioning herself for the first time.

Alex feels tears slide down her temples into her hair. The weight of her head is too much to lift, and she lays there for what feels like hours, letting fear and helplessness leak out of her, letting the world come to a slow stop so she can stumble off.

It feels like a dissection. She feels like Maggie cut her open and is peering inside as she prods with metal instruments, labeling each part on a diagram. All she can do is lay there, helpless, and hope she’ll survive. She hopes somehow she’ll be stitched back up again.

Alex shudders and sniffles, feeling pressure pulse between her eyes. She sits up and grabs a tissue and blows her nose.

She hasn’t felt this stupid since J’onn found her in jail all those years ago. _How_ could she not have known she was attracted to women?

But it isn’t _all_ women. Right? Maybe not even a handful of women. Just a few she can name. So maybe she isn’t a complete idiot. The girls she’s liked make sense. Vicky had matched her intensity, Natalie calmed her down, Priya matched her intellect and physicality.

And Maggie -- well, Maggie does all of that and then some, doesn’t she? She’s next in the line of girls that have confounded Alex. Smart, tough, and adventurous, with powers of observation that are suddenly unnerving.

Alex feels stupid. _So_ stupid. Of _course_ she likes Maggie. Even _Maggie_ knows she likes her.

What a disaster. And this time there is no J’onn to bail her out.

No, this time she has to bail herself out.

Even the thought is too exhausting to entertain.

She wakes in the morning heavy and sore. Her head hurts from the bourbon, but she takes comfort in the fact that she didn’t completely drown herself. She remembers everything. She dresses for work, foggy and distracted.

She thinks about how to proceed all day. She doesn’t want Maggie to see how much of a disaster she is if she can help it. She shouldn’t go to Maggie first. No, she has to strategize with her feelings, for once. Try to negotiate them into something more manageable.

How exactly does she feel? She’s never been good at dissecting that. She usually reaches for a bottle. But she’s already done that and she’s not much clearer.

But she knows one thing for sure: Maggie is beautiful, and she wants to be around her as much as she can.

She realizes midway through the day, with an air of intellectual triumph, that it isn’t about her not realizing she likes women. No, she just likes Maggie. This makes her feel much less stupid and much more in control. Still, liking a woman after twenty eight years of thinking she liked men - well, kind of - is a dramatic new self-schema.

She’s more grateful than ever she has Kara now, that she mended that fence enough to lean on it. She takes her half-gelled thoughts and a box of donuts and waits for Kara to get home from work. But Kara’s in a bluster about something and Alex swings like a gate in that direction, relieved for the distraction. She doesn’t know what words to use anyway. If she could draw a graph or table or develop an algorithm, she might know how to explain. But that’s not a language she and Kara share. She’s relieved when they’re interrupted, rushing back to her apartment, pulling up some case files to distract herself.

She gets a text from Winn, of all people, about some strange and upsetting detainee deaths at the NCPD precinct earlier that day, saying Maggie was on the scene when it happened. Alex is almost paralyzed with worry. Is Maggie okay? Who did she call? Maggie has no Kara of her own, no Hank, and now no girlfriend.

Alex feels compelled to go to her, to protect her in some way beyond the physical. It’s odd, feeling that way for someone besides Kara. She’s not sure it’s comfortable. Still, she can’t ignore the impulse.

She finds Maggie in the first place she looks. Maggie’s sitting there in the bar, hauntingly vacant, tossing back her second shot. For a moment Alex feels a flicker of panic, wondering if Maggie wants to spin herself into oblivion until things go quiet like Alex used to do. Like she did last night. But as she approaches, she feels like Maggie is solid enough that nothing can make her spin without spinning the rest of the world with her.

Alex approaches. Maggie is dazed and only half there until she seems to recognize it’s _Alex_ asking after her.

And as soon as Maggie makes eye contact, Alex feels something inside her unraveling. This wasn’t supposed to be about her, but Maggie isn’t falling apart, and though she knows it’s selfish, she can’t stop herself; all the things she’s been thinking about are pushing out from inside her ribs, begging to be freed. If she says it out loud, maybe she’ll have some reprieve.

She sits, and she faces Maggie, and she says as much as she can.

And to her surprise, it comes out collected and coherent and logical, like a formula any high schooler would understand. All the pieces she’s already put together, the reasons Rick Treewater and Brian Dalay and Elliot Pitzer didn’t captivate her. All those things line up on the sticky bar table.

Her whole life has been about being perfect. And though it has been anything but, she’s managed to project the semblance of perfection to the untrained eye in every respect except dating.

She stumbles only when she gets to the part that isn’t constructed yet. The part about her not being straight. She dances around it, looking to Maggie to fill in the words, to tell her what she means.

But Maggie doesn’t fill in the words. Those are hers to figure out, Alex realizes heavily. Maggie just nods and smiles, and Alex feels so stripped down and bare her skin crawls and her stomach twists. She holds Maggie’s gaze, wondering if she said enough, wondering if she said too much, wondering if Maggie knows how singular she is to have evoked all this in her. But then Maggie’s gaze is too much, it’s burning her, and Alex has to leave, she has to find that orbit that is neither too fast or too slow, and she has to spin in it until she finds her equilibrium again.

Still, she’s shown Maggie she’s not oblivious. She’s bought herself time. Time she’ll use to sort everything out.

She zips herself up as she leaves the bar. She goes home and lays in bed looking up at the ceiling, all the pieces of her life started to make sense, atoms coming together to form molecules, molecules coming together to form cells, cells coming together to form a terrified, trembling girl who scarcely knows what she’s made of.


	7. Laws of Motion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The events of 2x06, as seen from Alex's perspective. Including the kiss!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to my trusty beta @youreterriblemuriel for her input!

Alex is amazed at how well she can function by just pretending nothing is unusual, like Maggie didn’t just knock her out of orbit, like she didn’t just admit the biggest secret she has. She’s used to toughing things out and soldiering through, but she’s never experienced anything this disorienting. She can’t sleep. Every night she lays in bed, tossing and turning, exploring every corner of her enormous bed, hoping to find a corner that invites sleep.

 

Still, she can work, she can be a good sister, she can feed and bathe and clothe herself like a normal human being, while inside she’s in a constant state of turmoil. 

 

Alex likes Maggie. In a romantic way. She wants to go on dates with her and kiss her and get close to her in a way she’s never been close to someone. She understands this now. It’s not totally comfortable, but it’s okay. But she hates feeling this vulnerable. No one has ever had this kind of power over her. 

 

Still, there are worse things. Like kissing Rick Treewater and letting Brian Dalay grope her and having sex with Elliot Pitzer. 

 

She tries not to let her mind wander to what it would be like to kiss Maggie. Or to have sex with Maggie. But it’s hard not to. She wants more than a friend. So much more than a friend. She wants that thing she tried to create the illusion of in college, and she wants that joyfulness Kara has when she talks about her crushes. Because despite having a crush - god, that’s such a weird thing to admit - she doesn’t feel the joy of it. Not yet. It’s too eclipsed by fear.

 

Above all, she wants to feel like a normal girl who is capable of all the loving feelings humans are built with.

 

When she does accidentally imagine kissing Maggie, holding Maggie, she feels a sudden acceleration of her internal spinning, like her organs are whirling around in a frenzy, like new channels of bioelectricity are forming and little sparks are going off inside her. 

 

And she feels - it seems ridiculous after so many years of puzzling over why people got so worked up about sex -  _ turned on _ . The secret corners of her body suddenly fill with pressure and some other sensation that’s a bit like tingling but without the discomfort of a limb falling asleep. She feels like some parts of her are just waking up and coming online for the first time in her life. She’s almost paralyzed with it. What should she do? Wait for it to go away?

 

She feels like she was just handed a living creature and told to care for it with no further instructions. Only that living thing is part of  _ her _ , and it seems intent on staying. And it’s not quiet or part of the furniture like a caged bird or fish in its terrarium. It’s a wild and untamed thing, running around her apartment, barking and jumping, thrashing about and keeping her awake.

 

She tosses and turns and wonders if this part of her will ever be quelled.

 

And then one night she gets an idea that both excites and terrifies her. It almost feels like the idea came from somewhere else because it’s so not something she would do.

 

But touching herself while thinking about girls is a way to be certain about a few things. Maybe if she can get her body to settle after she comes, her thoughts will settle too.

 

She feels oddly formal and pragmatic about it. This is something people do for fun, not as a litmus test. She wonders if maybe she should warm herself up with some porn or something. But she’s already plenty warmed up. Plus her laptop is DEO-issued and she’s not about to invite any viruses onto it or have her colleagues track what she’s watching.

 

Purely out of hope that she’ll be able to settle and get some sleep, she tries touching herself. Eyes still closed from her fruitless pursuit of sleep, she slips her hand under her shorts and rests it there for a moment, feeling how soft her skin is right above where her hair starts, how warm she is. She pauses for just a moment, then slips down into the soft hot slick.

 

She tips her head back and exhales. This feels better than she remembers. She slides her fingers through a few times, delighted with how easy and soft it is, and wonders if other girls feel like this. If she were to do this to another girl - she tenses and accelerates in the most wonderful way at the thought - would the other girl feel this good? Would all the same spots set another girl off? Would she be as warm and liquid and glad? Would she start to breathe raggedly like Alex is now?

 

How would Maggie feel? What would Maggie sound like?

 

Alex freezes at the realization that she’s imagining Maggie specifically. She sees Maggie’s face, her soft dark wavy hair, her beautiful bronze skin, the flutter of her eyelashes, the quiver of her lip. A chill courses through her for a moment, and she worries she’s done something terrible and inappropriate, something vulgar and unwanted.

 

And yet it feels so good, her fingers keep moving.

 

Then she surges, and she can’t  _ stop _ thinking about Maggie. Picturing her hair splayed on the pillow, soft breathy sighs and little whines and groans. Alex hurtles into a glorious, ecstatic rhythm that leads her toward the best orgasm she’s ever had. It clenches hard, then rattles through her, and she can’t stifle the moan that forces its way from her mouth. 

 

She imagines Maggie is there, gasping and blissed out, and that the tightening around her fingers is actually Maggie.

 

And then they settle in the sheets, and all she can feel is Maggie’s warmth and happiness and smile. 

 

She’s wired. It’s too good to go back to sleep. She doesn’t want to forget for a second what it feels like. 

 

She gets a few minutes of relief before uneasiness takes over. What she just did feels disrespectful. She shouldn’t be thinking of her friend that way. It’s weird. She wouldn’t want anyone thinking of her that way. Well, anyone but Maggie. 

 

And now that she knows she likes Maggie - so much - she wonders what’s it’s really like.

 

Which leads her to her next dilemma: how does she let Maggie know what she wants? She’s pretty sure she didn’t come across as a total basket case at the bar the other night. Even if she’d wavered toward the end, at least she hadn’t cried or anything embarrassing.

 

If she can keep up the illusion of having her head above water, maybe Maggie will consider her. But she’s got to be extra perfect and actually try to be desirable for once. 

 

Has she been too needy or weird with Maggie so far? Has she made sure Maggie felt appreciated and special? She thinks so. But as she lays in bed, sticky and tired, she realizes she unloaded onto Maggie unfairly in the bar. Maggie had a terrible day, and Alex made it all about her. She’s suddenly consumed with guilt, both over that and what she just did without Maggie’s permission. She rolls over, hot with embarrassment, willing herself to think about anything else, and finally nods off after forcing herself to mentally recite the periodic table like she used to in high school to calm herself down.

 

* * *

 

She apologizes to Maggie at the next opportunity, promising herself to do better, to be better. She even gives herself a shred of over-intellectualized mercy, that perhaps this isn’t real, that what she feels for Maggie is just smoke and mirrors, that all the feelings she had for Vickie and Natalie and Priya were illusions too, and all this is some kind of stress reaction. But Maggie pushes that thought away and makes Alex feel impossibly light and hopeful; she promises happiness with an earnestness that unnerves Alex with its implications.

 

“No, it’s real. You’re real. And you deserve to have a real, full, happy life, okay?”

 

Alex is knocked out of her orbit for the thousandth time since she met Maggie. 

 

Maggie wants her to be happy. 

 

Alex has always been eager to prove herself, but this time she doesn’t know how. So she asks Maggie what next step she should take. 

 

And Maggie tells her in, in no uncertain terms. 

 

“Tell your family.”

 

Alex is too hopeful to ask. 

 

_ If I do this, will you want me? _

 

Maggie grins and promises Alex a drink when it’s done.

 

That’s all the motivation Alex needs to tell Kara.

 

A date. With Maggie.

 

Still, Alex is scared. She’s never had something so personal to tell anyone. All her supposed secrets - sleeping with Brian Dalay, her drinking, her work with the DEO, killing Astra - pale in comparison. 

 

She’s embarrassed she can’t do it right away. She needs to find the right time and the right words to tell Kara. And she still doesn’t have all the words. She flinches at some of them.  But she doesn’t want to face Maggie until it’s done, so she waits to return her calls until she has something she can be proud to tell her about. 

 

She finds the nerve to tell Kara after an especially good sparring session. She feels strong, she feels confident, and if she can pull off the bandaid quickly enough, it won’t hurt.

 

They’re walking and talking by the water, and Alex knows this is her best shot, when she doesn’t have to look Kara in the eye.

 

She almost chickens out. She can make something up about a botched mission or pretend she might need a minor surgery or something to justify the buildup. Those would be easy lies to tell. 

 

But she wants that date with Maggie so badly.

 

Kara can tell she’s nervous and assures her she can tell her anything. 

 

“It’s about M-“ She falters for a split-second. It’s her last chance to abandon her mission

 

She’s never abandoned a mission in her life. 

 

“Maggie.”

 

“Your cop friend,” Kara supplies.

 

God, this is even harder than Alex expected. Already she should clarify something. Maggie isn’t just a friend. Or maybe she shouldn’t clarify, since technically she and Maggie haven’t been on a date yet.

 

“She and I started working on- a couple cases together, and you know, we started… hanging out after work and, and you know, I, I… I started, um, thinking. About her.” 

 

Alex can hear herself. She sounds like a bumbling, ridiculous child. 

 

“I don’t know what that means,” Kara says. 

 

Alex winces. Her vagaries aren’t sufficient. 

 

She centers herself and gets right to the point.

 

“I started to, uh… develop…  _ feelings _ . For her.” 

 

She points to Kara, passing the conversation to her, begging her to fill in the rest.

 

Thankfully, Kara does. 

 

“Feelings. Like…”

 

“Those feelings. Yeah.”

 

Kara veers to the side and sits down on a bench, stunned.

 

“So… she’s gay. And are you saying you’re gay?”

 

Alex dodges the question. She doesn’t really know if that word fits her. She’s only really thought about Maggie. And maybe a few other women. It seems like a big deal to claim that, but Kara persists.

 

“Alex, it kinda sounds like you’re coming out to me.”

 

And Alex knows deep down she is. That’s what she set out to do. But it’s hard when she doesn’t have the words.

 

She’s a little defensive at Kara’s followup questions. Mostly because she can’t answer them. She’s not sure she’s gay, it’s not because she hasn’t met the right guy, and if everyone could stop  _ pushing _ her for a minute, she might figure it out. 

 

“I’m just trying to understand, okay?” Kara says.

 

Oh. Finally. A window. 

 

She tells Kara about how she can’t sleep, how her mind is racing, how the earth is spinning in a new direction, how she’s looking at every person she ever fell out with, how all her relationships look new and strange in this sudden floodlight, 

 

She gets it all out in so many words - maybe not the right ones - and it’s like ripping off that bandaid. She did it. It’s over. 

 

Except it hurts. So much. Kara knows her better than anyone in any galaxy, and she’s been with her through every piece she’s been puzzling over. And to see confusion and thinly masked revulsion on Kara’s face is almost too much to handle. 

 

She steels over, pulling her coat around her, and rushes home.

 

Alex regrets being so impulsive. She wonders if Maggie really knows what’s best, if she’s been misguided by her own brash impulse, and pulls away from both of them. She pours herself a drink and tries to pretend she isn’t gutted.

 

She’s good at being alone. She lives alone, she sleeps alone, she strategizes alone. She was alone for years during college and med school. Most of the time she still feels alone, even though she has Kara now.

 

It’s easy to pull away from Maggie. She doesn’t take her calls or respond to her texts. But Alex can’t handle the gap between her and Kara. She’s worked too hard to repair their bond to let it slip away because of something she was able to hide from even herself. She’d rather go on pretending she likes men than lose her sister.

 

She feels sick. The sleeplessness is even worse, and she can’t eat or do the most routine lab tests without botching them. She feels scraped raw inside, and stiff achiness sets into her muscles.

 

She had no idea rejection could be so physical.

 

She waits for Kara to come to her, but she doesn’t. Alex waits and waits. She tosses and turns and worries herself sick. What if she’s ruined the one good thing she has, the one person she trusts to stick by her? After a few days, she can’t take it anymore, and goes to find her. She confronts Kara, and Kara looks puzzled.

 

“You’ve been weird ever since I told you.” 

 

Kara gets defensive. “I don’t mean to be…You said you didn’t want to talk about it.”

 

“Well I do if you’re not okay with it!”

 

“I am  _ so _ okay with it!”

 

Alex is startled, and the world flips on its axis for the thousandth time. Kara beckons her to the couch, and she sits, desperate for some stillness. 

 

They sit. And they talk. And Kara showers her with love in the way only Kara can, in a way that is beyond human. She loves Alex unconditionally, loves her with humility and reverence and faith in a goodness Alex doesn’t think she possesses. Kara assures her that she is not alone, that she will never be alone, and she apologizes for taking up so much space between them.

 

Alex is stunned that anyone, most of all Kara, noticed she’s been trying to take up as little space as possible for fifteen years.

 

Tears come, as they have been so frequently lately, crumbling her like she’s made of sand. 

 

Now that she has someone to lean on, she can admit how insurmountable the road ahead seems.

 

“I can’t do this without you,” she whimpers.

 

“You don’t have to.”

 

Alex tries to breathe, but feels like she’s just learning how. 

 

Now that she has a little space, she doesn’t know how to fill it. 

 

Kara notices and prompts her.

 

“So what about Maggie? What’s she like?”

 

Alex warms and smiles for the first time that day. Her muscles loosen and her stomach settles. She feels like she’s floating a little off the couch.

 

“I, uh… I dunno. I just like her so much, you know?” she says, almost squeaking. It’s embarrassing to sound so much like Kara does when she talks about boys. She’s never been an excitable schoolgirl, never been giddy and light over another person. “She’s  _ smart _ , and she’s  _ tough _ , and she’s just…” She pictures Maggie’s beaming face, her sparkling eyes and unstrained smile. “Beautiful.” It feels like she can finally exhale at the admission. Maggie is  _ beautiful _ . It feels good to say. “She’s so beautiful.”

 

“So are you.”

 

Alex finally feels some peace.

 

Kara smiles, her soft, sunrise smile, and Alex can see Kara understands how she feels, can feel her happiness. Maybe some things are universal. 

 

Kara embraces her, and it feels like coming home after a long, exhausting mission. She breathes and realizes most of the spinning has stopped.

 

Her phone chimes and ruins the moment, of course. As it always does. Still, her reservoirs of hope have been refilled such that she doesn’t balk when Kara charges her with the task of asking Maggie out.

 

“I”ll go get the alien. You go get the girl.”

 

* * *

 

Alex braces herself as she enters the bar, borrowing her courage from Kara’s faith. She spots Maggie immediately, radiant in her simple white shirt leaning over the pool table. 

 

Alex knows that alchemy isn’t real. She knows matter can’t be transformed that way, that gold cannot be made from iron or lead. But when she looks at Maggie, she starts to believe that such things are possible, because she feels like her very cells are transformed.

 

“Hey Maggie.” Her voice wavers and she hopes Maggie doesn’t notice.

 

“Danvers! Hey, I was hoping you’d turn up. Any interest in a game?”

 

Alex straightens up, proud and brave as she can muster. She’s never asked someone out, and she wants to do it right. She wants to be clear and confident, but also smooth.

 

“Well, actually, I was wondering if you were still good for that drink you promised me.”

 

Maggie halts, then her smile widens in disbelief. “You told Kara?”

 

Alex gives a proud but casual nod, as though she wasn’t completely terrified and sleepless over it. 

 

“Yeah, you did!” Maggie lays her pool stick on the table and comes around with her arms up to hug Alex. “Aw, I’m so happy for you.” 

 

Alex embraces her, softer and more delicate than she’s ever held anyone, because Maggie feels so precious. Maggie is pressed to her, however briefly, and she feels a hint of the warmth and softness she imagined the other night. It’s better than she imagined. She doesn’t want to let go. 

 

It’s sweet and joyful, but it doesn’t answer Alex’s question.

 

Maggie continues, “I’m buying all night. What are you having?”

 

Alex doesn’t know what comes over her, but she knows in an instant there’s only one way to convey what she wants with absolute clarity.

 

She pulls Maggie to her and kisses her, a kiss twenty-eight years in the making.

 

It’s soft and intense and perfect and everything Alex has ever heard a kiss could be. 

 

Somewhere far away, a galaxy explodes.

 

Maggie’s lips are so soft, her cheeks so smooth under Alex’s hands, her chin so delicate. Alex could kiss her forever and not get tired of it.

 

Maggie pulls back first. 

 

“Wow.”

 

Alex almost tips forward into Maggie again.

 

“I have been wanting to do that for a long time,” she says.

 

And it’s true, though she didn’t realize it until she said it. Her body seems to be one step ahead of her tonight.

 

“Yeah, I can tell.”

 

It’s hedged and doesn’t acknowledge the galaxy they just blew up.

 

“Was that not okay?”

 

Maggie hesitates, and Alex remembers that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. 

 

“You didn’t do anything wrong.” 

 

It’s qualified.

 

Something crumples and extinguishes in Alex’s chest.

 

Maggie uses a lot of words, all gentle and kind. But the message is clear. 

 

Maggie doesn’t want her.

 

Alex reels. She’s never missed her mark by so much. She didn’t even hit the target.

 

She shutters up and leaves, barely making it out the door before she starts to cry.

 

Alex knows the reason she’s never really tried to be with someone, the reason she’s scoffed at other people’s desires to build something lasting, the reason she pretends to be above the need for human connection is because she’d rather pretend she doesn’t care than fail.

 

But she does care. She cares so damn much it physically pains her. And even though she threw everything she had at this thing with Maggie - all her courage and tenacity and willingness to be vulnerable, the possibility of losing her sister - she still failed.

 

And that’s a failure she doesn’t think she’ll ever recover from.

 

* * *

 

Kara finds her later that night when she’s three drinks in and unraveling. Kara forces her way in and pulls the truth from her. Alex yells for a moment, says she never should have said anything, she should have kept her mouth shut.

 

But Kara fixes her with her steadying gaze, reminding her of her unwavering faith and the space she promised to make for her, and Alex crumbles.

 

“She doesn’t like me… like that.”

 

Kara’s face falls, and with it, Alex’s heart drops again, even lower this time.

 

Kara pulls her to the couch and squeezes her as she shakes and cries.

 

“I’m proud of you.”

 

Alex shakes her head because Kara’s pride stands in such direct opposition to her shame. But Kara insists, holding Alex so hard she stops gasping as she cries, and finally calms to a place she can talk. 

 

“I shouldn’t have said anything,” Alex repeats. It sounds limp and soggy through her ragged voice, but she’s trying to get back to a place where she feels in control.

 

“No, I’m glad you told me,” Kara says, brushing her hair back. 

 

Alex is unbearably heavy. “I just… I mean, I- I don’t really know how I feel about anyone but Maggie. So I’m just… you know, embarrassed I made a big deal about it, because it’s probably not ever going to be anything.”

 

Kara studies Alex, not talking for a minute, though her hands absentmindedly stroke Alex’s shoulder and hair, looking for ways in.

 

Finally she takes a breath. “You know how you were so afraid for me when I revealed myself? How you were certain I’d regret it?”

 

Alex nods, rolling her eyes at the parallel she knows Kara’s going to suggest.

 

“I’m not going to say that I never doubted my choice. When I think about the people I didn’t save or the trust I broke or the mistakes I made, I still feel ashamed sometimes. I’m always going to want to be better. And I know you know what that’s like.”

 

Alex snorts. 

 

“But Alex… I wouldn’t take back being Supergirl for anything. And I hope… I really, really hope that someday you’ll be glad you told me. Because what if this is one of the best parts of you? Something that makes you happier than you thought you could be?”

 

It’s a strange and impossible suggestion. Alex tries to entertain it for a fleeting moment. But entertaining that hope is almost as exhausting as not having it. “I don’t think being gay is a superpower, Kara,” she mumbles. 

 

She can’t make eye contact as she says it. 

 

But she says it. She says she’s gay. Out loud. For the first time. Because deep down, she knows she is.

 

Kara says, “The beginning of any big change is the hardest part. And you got dealt a rotten hand. But… there are a lot of beautiful women out there.”

 

Kara’s eyes hint at playfulness while Alex’s shift around.

 

“And smart and brave and even a few who could kick your butt in a fight,” Kara adds with an affectionate dig to Alex’s ribs.

 

Alex raises her eyebrows skeptically.

 

“Okay, not many. On this planet at least. But you only need one.”

 

Alex’s face falls at the thought. She’s only certain about Maggie, and if Maggie is her one, it’s hopeless.

 

Kara seems to see she’s deflating again and knocks her gently with her knee. “Hey,” she says. “Wanna go flying?”

 

Kara hasn’t offered to fly for fun since they were teenagers and it was fun because it was forbidden.

 

“I wish we could,” Alex says. Everything about her feels weak. Especially her heart. 

 

Kara pouts, nodding in understanding. They can go flying whenever they want. But they can’t go flying the way they used to. She tips her head into Alex.

 

“I’m sleeping here tonight, by the way,” Kara mumbles. “I’m gonna get ice cream and we’re gonna watch Gilmore Girls.”

 

Alex groans and Kara rocks subtly from side to side, hugging Alex to her. 

 

They stay like that for a long time, and Alex feels a gentle mercy in just letting herself be held.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Interesting that they referenced that last scene in the finale, hm? I love that they did.
> 
> Churning out these chapter is tough for me, and hearing that you all are enjoying it helps me stay focused and motivated. Comments are magic!


	8. Rainbow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise, bitches.
> 
> I bet you thought you'd seen the last of me.
> 
> These last few chapters have been mostly done for a long time. I've been busy with my psychotherapy practice and living out fanfic irl with my new girlfriend. Things are good. I'm just sorry I've neglected this story for so long.
> 
> In an effort to finish, I'm posting the final chapters with a little less attention to detail than I would normally. But I figure imperfect chapters are better than an unfinished story. I hope you enjoy!

The days following Maggie's rejection aren’t easy, but they’re made easier knowing how firmly Kara believes in her. Kara’s steadfastness gives her strength.

She burrows into work as usual, and aside from J’onn, no one can tell anything’s amiss. In some ways it feels like she’s found her stride again. It’s almost as though something worked itself out of her system in that dreadful kiss. She doesn’t feel compelled to push herself into her new identity, and she can go back to pushing herself in the way she’s most accustomed to.

Maggie calls and texts a few times, but Alex doesn’t respond. She’s not mad. Well, she’s a little mad, but mostly she’s embarrassed and needs space.

Kara seems to hover around her like a pesky drone, making sure she’s okay. Alex tries to prove she is, but Kara’s concern is just as super as the rest of her. She dotes on Alex, and Alex feels smothered and like she owes Kara something in return. In an effort to prove she’s okay, as well as distract Kara and her other friends, she brings her to Maggie’s bar. Well, it’s not Maggie’s bar, but she’s rarely been there without her.

She’s nervous as they enter. She hasn’t been back since that misguided kiss, and she’s worried the guilt and shame she’s been staving off will pounce on her. But she knows what it means to Kara to feel less alone, James is always up for new things, and Winn will practically explode with geeky happiness, so she steels herself and leads them in.

They have a few drinks, and Alex slips out of her learned vigilance. It’s probably a bad idea in a place potentially crawling with criminals.

But the creature that catches her most off guard is human.

“Danvers!”

Alex wobbles as she moves to stand, then thinks better of it, letting Maggie approach their table and introducing her to Kara and James and Winn. She fumbles her words, but she looks at Maggie as though daring her to do or say anything to disrupt their night.

Maggie does a double-take when she sees Kara, and for a moment Alex is convinced she sees through Kara’s disguise and knows her secret. But if Maggie knows, her eyes don’t let on.

Instead, Maggie pulls her aside, asking why she hasn’t returned any of her calls and texts.

Alex bluffs, saying she’s been busy, as though the past week hadn’t been an exercise in licking her wounds and pretended she’s not torn up about Maggie’s rejection.

Maggie looks skeptical. “There must have been a lot of rogue aliens at large.”

Maggie is letting her lie. Maggie would know if there was a sudden outbreak, and if there had been anything that they could have collaborated on, they would have.

Maggie is letting her lie, and that reawakens all her embarrassment over that damn kiss.

Still, her shame isn’t clouding everything. She’s holding herself together, throwing herself into work. She’s been a beast in the training room, earning a few concerned looks from Kara and J’onn. But she feels her strength returning, at least on the outside.

She has to maintain that tough exoskeleton though, especially around Maggie. So when Maggie asks if they’re okay, Alex tells her, however disingenuously, that they are. She’s a little snippy when Maggie pokes at her, hoping Maggie will stop reminding her of her rejection. She even spits Maggie’s words back at her.

“I’m fresh off the boat, that’s not your thing. It’s no big deal.”

She wouldn’t have passed a lie detector test with that response, and if Maggie’s worth her salt as a cop she knows it, but Alex banks on Maggie wanting to believe it bad enough to overlook the obvious lie.

Maggie looks relieved, all too eager to believe Alex. “It’s nothing personal.”

Alex has to fight the urge to roll her eyes. How much more personal could things get? “Didn’t think it was.”

But Maggie seems hesitantly pacified, and like she might let Alex go back to her friends and sister. “Okay, good. Still friends?”

The urge to roll her eyes gets even stronger. Somehow she never thought coming out would result in her having to reassure _Maggie_. It's supposed to be the other way around. But she does, if only because she’s not ready to lose Maggie entirely. “Of course.”

It’s not without an ounce of resentment, and Alex is glad she’s got a second beer and a sympathetic — and likely eavesdropping — sister waiting back at the table.

She takes a sip of her beer, hoping to settle, but she doesn’t. Maggie is all too eager to pretend there was never a flirtation or hint of feelings, and it makes Alex angry that she’s the one who has to take the fall for it.

* * *

Winn is a terrible liar, and Alex barely has to look at him to get him to cough up Guardian’s identity.

Just when Alex was feeling better about her relationship with Kara — she suspects Kara came with Super empathy in addition to everything else, which just isn’t fair — she’s forced to keep James’ secret from her, which feels shitty all around.

She takes it out on Maggie a few days later. Maggie is trying to get back to business as usual, but Alex resents it.

Alex asks Maggie to drop the investigation into Guardian and, as expected, Maggie asks why.

Alex can’t tell her why.

“C’mon, Alex, we’re _friends_.”

It feels manipulative and forced and so  _ wrong _ Alex has a visceral reaction. How  _ dare _ Maggie pretend there was never anything more than friendship between them, even if it was one-sided. She can never go back to “business as usual” with Maggie because there was never a “business as usual.” Maggie will never be just another colleague or friend, and Alex is done trying to reassure her. She’s done being hurt.

Alex is so, so hurt.

Maggie was supposed to be her guide, the person who walked her through all the unknown. Now, she just wants to be a spectator.

“No, Maggie, we’re  _ not _ friends.”

Maggie stops walking and looks confused.

Surprised that Maggie could be so dense, Alex lays all her cards on the table, all the reasons Maggie should know better than to call her a friend, all the reasons she’s hurting.

Once she starts talking, she can’t stop.

“We hung out. We got  _ close _ . Then you called me out for liking you, and then I had the guts to admit, ‘Yes, it’s  _ true _ .’ And you told me that my feelings were  _ real _ and that I deserved to be happy, and so I thought you meant that I deserved to be happy with  _ you _ .”

“Alex…”

A built up wave of resentment is pushing its way out of Alex and she can’t stop it.

“No, no, no, I’m not done. Because then you convinced me to come out to my sister, and I  _ did _ . Because I was sure of  _ one _ thing. And that was my feelings for  _ you _ .”

Alex looks at Maggie, brow crinkled in concern, and god, it’s adorable, but she hates how it has the power to erode her anger. No one has ever had that power over her.

All it takes is a second to catch her breath before she’s wavering.

She remembers all the reasons she liked Maggie.  _ Likes _ Maggie. Her ambition, her toughness, her intelligence, her laugh.

But mostly how Alex feels around her.

Alex softens a little bit, because  _ god _ , Maggie is amazing. She’s an asshole, but she’s still someone Alex has feelings for. 

It occurs to Alex that maybe Maggie really  _ doesn’t _ understand everything she did for her. Maybe she needs to tell her.

“Initially, I was terrified. But ultimately, I was  _ proud _ to come out. Because it wasn’t just some concept. It was about my feelings for this…  _ amazing _ woman.”

Maggie’s gaze falls and Alex almost takes a moment to wonder why. But she’s almost done with what she needs to say and she can’t lose her nerve or start to cry first.

“But now? I don’t feel…  _ liberated _ , or like I’m on some great journey. All I feel is pain because  _ you _ don’t want me.”

Maggie tries to protest, but Alex is on the verge of tears. She has to get away before Maggie sees.

“You know what? Save it. Okay, let’s- It’s not what’s important right now. What’s important is that  _ you _ back off Guardian.”

Maggie is staring at her, stunned.

Alex hurries away, hoping Maggie doesn’t see her trembling.

* * *

She regrets it a few days later. Maggie is the first NCPD officer on the scene, gun out and pointed at James. Alex can’t help looking over at her, wondering what she’ll do.

Maggie looks at her several times.  And then she lowers her weapon.

Alex is stunned, and underneath her relief for James she’s disappointed. No, she’s not disappointed. She’s angry and even more confused. There is only one reason Maggie would back down like that, and it contradicts all of Maggie’s assertions that she only thinks of Alex as a friend. 

She almost calls Maggie out on it, but thinks better of it. Maggie wouldn’t take well to being told she has feelings for Alex too, even if she’s not planning to acknowledge them. On the ride home Alex reasons it’s possible she guilted Maggie into letting Guardian go, which feels less like a victory and more like a reminder of the pittance she got for all her trying.

She doesn't sleep much that night, replaying the expression on Maggie's face, wondering what on earth was going through her mind. 

* * *

Maggie shows up at Kara’s unannounced a few days later.

Alex feels a whole-body swoop of excitement followed immediately by the hard slam of her guard going up. Whatever Maggie’s doing here, she can’t leave herself open. 

It’s weird for Maggie to just show up. Not only is the visit unannounced, but it takes Alex a minute to figure out how Maggie even knows where Kara lives. She doesn’t think Maggie would use the police database for a personal matter; Maggie’s a better cop than that. But then she remembers Maggie dropped her off outside the building once, and Kara’s name is on her mailbox.

Alex steps out into the hall, trying to contain whatever Maggie’s about to bring on. She’d been so focused on containing the nonsense James has been up to lately -- masquerading as a superhero, going on suicide missions and getting dangerous attention from law enforcement -- she doesn’t want to risk combining both matters.

“Hey,” she says, trying to convey now isn’t a great time. “What are you, uh… what are you doing here?”  She doesn’t hold back her annoyance and it’s more than a bit chilly. She doesn’t owe Maggie anything. Maggie let Guardian go of her own accord.

“I really need to talk to you.”

Alex hopes it’s a business matter than can be dealt with through channels more appropriate than this. 

“If you just give me two minutes of your time, I promise I’ll be out of your hair."

Alex lowers her chin. She learned in her first days at the DEO that she can withstand anything for two minutes. Still, being around Maggie isn’t something she trained for. 

“Two minutes,” Alex agrees.

Maggie nods uncertainly, looking at Alex with an odd expression that almost looks like pleading. 

“I heard everything you said. And... I get it.  And if you never wanna talk to me again, then I’ll respect that -- I’ll disappear. But I don’t meet many people that I care about, and I care about you… a lot. You’ve become really important to me, and, uh… I hope that one day you and I can be friends. Because I don’t want to imagine my life without you in it.”

Maggie is weirdly bumbling and apologetic. Alex is unprepared for such a genuine, sheepish declaration of -- what, exactly? Alex isn’t sure Maggie’s words are really what she means. But there’s something genuine and raw there, and Alex feels it. 

It doesn’t mean Alex forgives her, or that she even wants to be friends. But she wants to know Maggie’s motive.

And maybe -- just maybe -- someday they’ll get back to talking the way they use to over pool, over pancakes, or a beer. Maybe somehow they’ll erase that kiss and everything that came after. Maybe this is Maggie’s plea for a reset on the last two weeks.

Maggie’s face begs for an inch.

Alex gives her a few millimeters. 

“Pool. Tomorrow night.”

It’s as cold as the vodka Alex ia about to get from Kara’s freezer, and Alex meant it to be that way.  If Maggie wants friendship, she’ll have to work for it. Alex is done doing the work.

Maggie smiles sheepishly and nods, and Alex closes the door, sealing all the upheaval Maggie brings back into the outside world. 

* * *

They go out a few nights later. They don’t actually play pool. Instead they sit at a table like they did that first night Maggie brought her to the bar, and they have a drink. It’s awkward at first, and Alex doesn’t make an effort to compensate for it. Maggie does though, and after a few failed attempts at small talk, Maggie launches into a case she’s working on that has Alex instantly intrigued. She almost wants to curse Maggie for appealing to her intellect. It’s just so easy for them to talk shop, so easy to put their heads together. Alex would have been content to sit in the bar all night talking -- she’s amazed at how normal she feels now -- but decides against ordering a second drink. She doesn’t want to slip back into anything or entertain too much hope around Maggie. So she pays her half of the bill and heads home, mulling over a few yearning looks and smiles that she could have sworn were flirtatious.

She wonders if it’s just different with girls, if their social cues and courtship signals are as foreign to her as Kryptonese once was. She wonders if her skill with languages will transfer to lesbian dating signals. Probably not, but it’s worth hoping.

She lays awake for hours, trying to redirect her thoughts from Maggie’s sparkling eyes or the way her voice gets lower and more steady when she’s talking about a fascinating case. She tries to put up boundaries and limits and tell herself over and over Maggie can only be a colleague.

Dawn comes early, and with it more work, and more restlessness, and a creeping sense that she’s once again in over her head. 

It isn’t until a few nights later after a long but perfectly executed mission that Alex feels normal again. Well, maybe normal isn’t quite the right word, because she’s never felt like this before. 

She stops to pick up some food from one of her favorite dives on her way home. As she’s waiting, she notices a girl. A woman, really. Alex doesn’t know where the line between girl and woman is lately. 

The girl is pretty. She’s around Alex’s age, with a solid build and some nice muscle definition in her arms. She’s wearing a black tank top and skinny jeans. Normally Alex wouldn’t look at anyone twice, but as she glances at the girl, she notices a small but unmistakable rainbow keychain dangling from her pocket.  

It could be a coincidence, but Alex is pretty sure girls don’t randomly carry rainbow lanyards. No, this girl is probably gay.

Alex considers her again, takes in her full appearance. She’s pretty, and strong, and her confident stance piques Alex’s interest. She scans the rest of her, the way she would a suspect or threat, only more positively. Alex feels warm and activated in a way she wishes she could express. She wishes she could go up to her and say, “Hey, me too!” or give a secret signal or knowing nod. Instead, she studies her, wondering what she does for a living, who she goes home to, what keeps her from going off the deep end. She looks for clues but doesn’t see many. Without hearing her speak or making eye contact she can’t use much of her DEO training.

Still, she finds herself wondering if maybe this girl someone she would get along with. Maybe they’d be friends, or even date. Alex decides she definitely finds her attractive. Beautiful, even. 

That warm feeling of kinship in her chest is now coupled with the joy of feeling something so normal, something other people were able to recognize so much earlier in life.

She can’t see the woman’s left hand as she waits for her food. Only when her number is called does she raise her hand, and Alex sees there’s a ring there.

So the woman is married, or at least engaged. That’s fine. Alex hadn’t been planning to ask her out of anything. She’s not even disappointed. Maggie’s rejection still smarts a little, and she’s not ready to date. But this strange girl has helped her heal without even realizing. 

It’s faint, but Alex can imagine dating a girl who isn’t Maggie. Maybe someday she will. Maybe someday she’ll even marry.

As Alex picks up her food and walks back to her bike, she feels like the world is full of possibilities. Possibilities she can pursue now that she knows who she is. And that feels pretty damn good.


	9. Nebulae

Alex’s efforts to keep Maggie at a distance she can tolerate are short-lived. After Maggie stumbled through her convoluted apology, Alex met up with her mostly to prove that she could handle it. But the slew of texts and calls that follow means Maggie wants to engage again, and it’s unclear on what terms.

 

Alex realizes those terms are hers now. So she makes them clear: she’ll go out and play pool and talk shop, but there will be no talking about feelings and definitely no talking about that kiss or anything leading up to it. 

 

They go out again a few nights later, and it’s okay. It’s not as much fun as they used to have, but it’s better than Alex expected. Maggie tells her about her recent trip home to Nebraska, how it was great to see her little sister and brother, and how she even ran into her high school best friend that she was in love with. It’s nice to hear so much about Maggie’s life, but in a way it feels like bait to lure Alex in deeper. Alex keeps her guard up, keeping her side of the conversation about work, which feels disingenuous, since ninety percent of her mental energy lately has gone to thinking about Maggie.

 

But it’s okay. They’re okay. Alex tries to keep her hope afloat, reminding herself she could meet someone else at any time.

 

Those odds feels slim no matter how she tries to manipulate herself into believing it.

 

Then there’s an attack on the bar, and the first and only thought Alex has is for Maggie’s safety. She can’t think about anything else until the notification pops up on her phone.

 

_ Yeah, I’m okay. Shaken but physically fine. _

 

The fact that Maggie admits to being shaken strikes Alex as oddly intimate. For someone as tough and unflappable as Maggie, she might as well have admitted to sobbing alone in the bathroom at work.

 

_ we’re gonna figure out who did this. someone will have to answer for it. _

 

Alex expects a snappy response like,  _ Wouldn’t expect anything less from you _ , but instead she gets an emotionless  _ Thanks _ . 

 

Alex would have offered to get a drink or bring over some food or something, but she’s not sure that honors the bulky boundary that has to be between them. Besides, Eliza is flying in that night and Alex needs to tidy up and put on a brave face.

 

Her brave face fools no one, least of all her mother, who keeps giving Alex inquisitive looks when no one else is looking. Alex wonders if she’s that transparent. 

 

She figures she’s going to have to tell her mom eventually. She starts to a few times, then backs out, wondering if she should wait until she has a girlfriend or something - if that ever happens - to give Eliza something concrete to understand. Maybe that would be easier for both of them. But that’s a lot of pressure to put on a mythical girl, and her mom is apparently one step ahead of her.

 

They’re in the lab, and Alex is at the computer, and Eliza forces it out of her.

 

“So what is it?”

 

Alex explains she’s analyzing the virus that killed everyone in the alien bar.

 

“No, I mean, I know you’ve been trying to tell me something.”

 

“Oh… No.” She wishes that mythical girl would materialize, or that she’d find herself in another timeline where this conversation had happened years ago and they could focus on work.

 

Except she doesn’t. Part of her needs to hear her mother tell her she’s going to be okay. Even though she’s grown, she still feels like a little girl about this.

 

“No?”

 

Alex is so tired from the emotional rollercoaster she’s been on lately, she doesn’t have the fortitude to conceal anything. Still, she’s baffled that her mother knew something was happening. She thought she’d put up such a good front.

 

She sighs. “How?”

 

“Keeping a secret disagrees with you, sweetie.”

 

Alex bristles. She hates that her mother likes to remind her of how lost she was, how she tried to conceal her drinking and partying during med school, that she thought she’d fooled everyone until she realized Eliza knew everything. 

 

But being gay isn’t like partying too hard or almost getting a DUI. It’s not something she’s supposed to be ashamed of or feel bad about. It’s just something she’s not ready to share.

 

“This isn’t like that, mom.”

 

“Does it have anything to do with  _ Maggie _ ?” 

 

Eliza says it gently, but Alex feels vivisected. 

 

“You mention her a  _ lot _ ,” her mother explains.

 

Alex feels stupid for not being able to control how much she talked about the girl she has a crush on. It’s adolescent and embarrassing. She doesn’t say anything, afraid if she does the dam will break.

 

“Oh, my  _ beautiful _ Alexandra, why is it so hard for you to tell me?”

 

Her mother’s words tell her everything she needs to hear.

 

She’s okay. She’s loved and understood in a way she thought would take ages. All she has to explain now is why she didn’t tell her mom.

 

“I feel like I’m, uh… I’m letting you down somehow?”

 

Eliza sighs, as though Alex’s lack of faith in her is a personal shortcoming. “Why would your being  _ gay _ ever let me down?”

 

The word is still a shock to Alex’s taxed system. She’s said it once or twice, but hearing her mother use it reinforces its bind on her. It’s a word she has to learn to wear.

 

“You always wanted me to have a regular life.”

 

The brief moment it takes Eliza to respond tells Alex that there’s nothing irregular about being gay.

 

“Alex, look at the life our family has led. Look at me, look at your  _ sister _ . I don’t think you believe I ever expected you to have a regular life. You were always going to be different, Alex, because you were always exceptional. And I  _ love _ you, however you are.”

 

Alex can’t hold back the tears. In her mother’s eyes, her gayness is the most normal thing about her. 

 

“Come here.”

 

Alex tips forward and her mother holds her in a way she hasn’t let herself be held in years.

 

Finally, she has a moment of peace.

 

* * *

 

The soothing doesn’t last long. Alex gets wind of a standoff at L Corp, one she doesn’t have time to get to as quickly as Kara. She’s on her way to provide backup when she hears Maggie’s been injured.

 

Maggie’s  _ injured _ .

 

Alex is terrified. 

 

The girl who drew her out of all her intellectualization and rationale for avoiding relationships, the girl who woke up a part of her she didn’t realize was sleeping, might not live much longer. All she can think about is getting to her, helping her, making sure she gets the best care. 

 

The details of boundaries and who hurt who and the fact that they’re “just friends” don’t matter. If Maggie died today not knowing how grateful Alex is for her, Alex would never forgive herself. 

 

She barks at Kara to tell her everything, and Kara assures her it’s a superficial wound, but Alex doesn’t hear it. She rushes to the base, dashing in to find Maggie delirious on a gurney, blood soaking through her Henley.

 

Eliza is hovering over her, and Alex is grateful because she doesn’t trust anyone else with Maggie’s care. She rushes forward, helping cut off Maggie’s vest. She looks away as her shirt and bra are cut off, but just until a med tech places a paper sheet over Maggie’s chest. Even in crisis, she doesn’t want to intrude on Maggie’s privacy.

 

Maggie seems to become aware of her surroundings, suddenly gasping and thrashing, and Alex feels her whole ribcage squeeze with fear and helplessness. Maggie’s hyperventilating, and Eliza is right on it, offering her a tranquilizer. Maggie accepts and comes down fast over the next few minutes, finally laying limp and dazed. 

 

Somehow, Alex finds herself holding Maggie’s hand, not sure who is gripping tighter between the two of them.

 

Alex feels herself calm when they get Maggie cleaned up and she sees the wound is smaller than she expected. It will only need a few stitches. Eliza extracts a metal shard and takes it to be analyzed, giving Alex an entirely inappropriate wink as she leaves the room.

 

Alex can’t believe how panicked she was hearing Maggie was hurt. Looking at the wound now, she feels silly. Maggie will be fine. She’s had worse.

 

She feels like part of the tranquilizer hit her. She’s calm now. She steps into her practiced bedside manner, chatting about this and that as she stitches Maggie up, trying to make jokes where she can.

 

But something is tugging at her conscience, and though it might be a cop-out to do it when Maggie is drugged and helpless, she knows that, in lieu of apology for all her behavior that must seem completely erratic, she needs to let Maggie know she’s off the hook. Alex is done guilting her or calling in favors or trying to force something out of Maggie that isn’t there. 

 

She’d be lying if she didn’t admit she wanted Maggie to see how much progress she’d made. She can say the word now —  _ gay _ — and she knows Maggie is just one piece of a larger picture she’s seeing for the first time. Maybe someday she’ll be happy with someone who isn’t Maggie. She’s gay, no matter how Maggie feels about her. She makes sure to use the word so Maggie can hear her say it. 

 

“When you first suggested that I was gay, well, uh… I denied it. And then I thought it was all about  _ you _ , because… how could I  _ not _ like you? But deep down I think I just wasn’t comfortable that that was… my new normal. Because it  _ is _ my new normal. And I’m happy that it is.”

 

As she’s talking, she realizes how much she owes to Maggie. Her gratitude eclipses anything else she feels, and the anger and embarrassment and resentful thoughts are snuffed out. 

 

Maggie smiles and listens, a little drugged and dazed. But her pupils are focused and her smile indicates she heard Alex.

 

Before Alex goes home that night, in the wee hours of the morning, she checks in with the driver of Maggie’s car that she got home safe.

 

Alex is more at peace than she’s felt in a long time. The people she cares about are all safe and know she appreciates them. 

 

It’s a good feeling. 

* * *

 

Alex is energized the next day, knowing her task for the moment is being enough for herself. Maybe someday there will be a beautiful girl who can keep up with her. As Kara said, she only needs one. And since she’s feeling more comfortable in her skin, celebrating her progress alone doesn’t feel sad or embarrassing or lonely. After a solid day’s work, she goes home and puts on her pajamas, pours herself a drink, and contemplates all the possibilities the future holds. Maybe someday she’ll share her nightcap with another woman. 

 

But tonight, she’s got hope, and that’s enough.

 

She’s surprised when Maggie comes over so late. Her heart does its little  _ ping _ as usual and her stomach flips and she gets a little tingly, but there’s no cinch of pain to it, no knife to the gut. Maggie is one of many girls she could be happy with. Maggie’s currently the only one Alex is aware of, but the universe is big.  

 

Standing there outside her door with pizza and beer, Alex considers that maybe Maggie is only meant to be a gatekeeper of sorts.

 

She invites her in, pleased she’s so at-ease. With dating off the table, she doesn’t worry that she’s in her pajamas or drinking alone on a Saturday night. 

 

She’s an adult, and she can do this friendship thing.

 

Maggie seems anxious, and Alex keeps moving around the kitchen to give her space to settle. Alex wonders if, now that the drugs have worn off, Maggie’s freaked out about what happened the night before. Maggie rambles on in her cute way, her little pinched voice sounding sheepish and apologetic. As Alex hears her start to unpack what happened at L Corp, she softens even further, realizing what it means that Maggie has come to her to talk about it. Maggie probably doesn’t debrief missions that went badly with very many people. Alex is honored to be one of them.

 

It takes Alex a few moments to realize the incident at L Corp  _ isn’t _ what Maggie came over to talk about. Maggie wants to that about  _ that _ thing. The thing she thought they were done talking about after their conversation last night. She thought she’d let Maggie off the hook. She thought  _ she _ was off the hook.

 

She sees a tension building in Maggie’s body, sees her hands wringing and her words coming out more chopped and hesitant. Alex pauses, waiting to get plates out of the cabinet until Maggie finishes. Alex feels a creeping sense of anticipation, but Maggie hops from word to word, uncertain and fragmented, and it isn’t until she exhales and her eyes fall into an unbreakable, adoring gaze that Alex understands.

 

At least, she thinks she does.

 

“… We should kiss that girls we want to kiss. And I just— I want to kiss you.”

 

Maggie is--

 

Maggie  _ does-- _

 

Maggie  _ wants to _ \--

 

There’s a split second Maggie gives her to object or move away. Alex is frozen in disbelief, but she wouldn’t move even if she could.

 

And then Maggie is kissing her, so much softer and more attentive and sweet than anything Alex has ever felt. Maggie’s hands cradle her face, her shoulders curl toward her, her feet lift, and Alex has never felt more wanted or cared for or stunned in all her twenty eight years.

 

The world spins faster than it ever has in its existence, but Alex is frozen in a moment of perfect stillness at its axis.

 

The kiss feels sacred. She didn’t know it could feel this way. A full-body swoop of salvation, a rush forward from the heart.

 

Maggie pulls back first, nervous, but Alex keeps her eyes closed in case the spell breaks when she opens them. 

 

What just happened seems so perfect, so taken from a fairy tale, Alex doesn’t want it to be over.

 

But Maggie is nervous, so Alex cracks a joke. 

 

“So what you’re saying is you  _ like _ me.”

 

Maggie’s laughter shatters any tension that’s left. Alex feels like she could float up out of the atmosphere, she’s so elated. 

 

Alex can’t believe how all her anger and pain evaporates as her lips dry. She forgives Maggie without effort. She can’t help but adore Maggie, in all her sweet, cautious mess.

 

Even though she’s only kissed a girl twice now, she reaches forward, letting her adoration crash over Maggie, kissing her the way she wants to kiss her, showing Maggie that, finally, they are on the same page at the same time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are encouraging in this home stretch! This story has been a labor of love - emphasis on the labor - and I appreciate hearing from readers.


	10. Motion and Stillness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is where this story departs from canon. I wasn’t a fan of how the Supergirl reveal went down, so this is how I would have wanted it to go... among other things that can’t be shown on screen. 
> 
> It also goes without saying that in my imagining of their relationship, they agree on the kid issue and live happily ever after.

Somehow on their seventh -- or ninth? -- date they’ve ended up in Alex’s kitchen baking chocolate chip cookies. Kara would be positively pink with indignation that they bought pre-made dough, but would probably forgive Alex for making such a romantic and domestic gesture.

 

They’d gone out to dinner first, but Alex had overshot and taken Maggie somewhere a little too fancy. Their first few dates Maggie had planned, and she’d shown Alex some of the coolest bars and underground comedy shows and microbreweries in National City. Tonight Maggie’s body language had indicated she wasn’t quite comfortable at the upscale restaurant, so Alex had scrapped her plan for dessert, inviting Maggie over for wine and cookies instead. 

 

Maggie places the dough on the baking sheet as Alex corks a bottle of wine and pours it into glasses.

 

She takes a sip and regards Maggie, standing in her socks in Alex’s kitchen, placing balls of dough on the baking sheet precisely, as though they were chess pieces. She looks so beautiful and content. Alex is glad she brought her here instead of taking her to some fussy dessert place. Now that she has her, she doesn’t want to share her with the rest of the world as much.

 

She takes another sip and realizes she’s smiling. Maggie looks up, and Alex expects her to quirk an eyebrow, asking what Alex is smiling about.

 

Instead Maggie grins back. It’s secretive and girlish and makes Alex’s stomach flip and her cheeks tingle and her chest glow.

 

They’re smiling for the same reason.

 

Maggie finishes placing the balls of dough on the tray and slides it into the oven.

 

“Aren’t we just the picture of lesbian domesticity,” Maggie says, closing the oven door.

 

Alex keeps smiling, but something darts through her, making her less steady.

 

Maggie washes her hands and Alex tries to find the source of anxiety. 

 

“Have you always used that word?” Alex asks.

 

“What word?”

 

“Uh -- lesbian?”

 

Alex cringes as she says it. It feels… well, not dirty. Not wrong. Just… off.

 

“Um… no, I probably just said gay for the first few years. Why?”

 

“Well-- It’s a weird one for me. Like, the meaning and the sentiment are totally what I feel. You know, I’m not just  _ gay _ -” That word is comfortable now. “-I’m a woman exclusively attracted to women. But I still… I don’t know.”

 

“It comes with a lot of baggage, not the least of which is badly made porn.”

 

“Maybe. But I feel like I should be able to say it without any negative association.”

 

Maggie smiles, leaning closer. “Then we’ll just have to give you some positive associations.”

 

She kisses up the side of Alex’s neck, waiting until Alex shivers before whispering the word, “Lesbian.” 

 

Alex lets out a nervous laugh and runs a hand up Maggie’s arm.

 

Maggie switches sides and runs her tongue up to her ear, licking the shell and nibbling on the lobe. Alex lets out a little gasp.

 

“Lesbian.”

 

Alex giggles easier now, and Maggie continues pressing into her, backing her up against the counter until Alex pushes back. Maggie keeps grinning as they kiss and kiss and move toward the couch, trying not to break contact. Maggie lands on her back, beaming as Alex hovers over her, smug and just a little breathless.

 

“Lesbian,” Alex says as she falls forward onto Maggie. 

 

They kiss for a while, whole-bodied and deep and intense and a million times more fun than Alex thought kissing could be. They kiss until they both smell the cookies burning and dart up at the same time, yanking the singed dough out of the oven that seems cool in comparison to Alex’s body.

 

Once they get over their disappointment about the cookies, they laugh.

 

“Been awhile since a girl had me that distracted,” Maggie says.

 

“Yeah, well… been longer for me,” Alex giggles.

 

Maggie’s grin softens and she rubs Alex’s arm. “I’m happy for you,” she said. “And also for me.”

 

Alex gives her a peck on the cheek. It’s so strange and new to have desire and permission to do that to someone.

 

She sees an opening for questions too.

 

“Hey, I wanted to ask you,” Alex says with an air of forced casualness. “What did you mean when you said you were scared?”

 

“I said I was scared? Doesn’t sound like me.” 

 

Alex smirks. “About me coming out for you.”

 

“ _ Oh _ ,” Maggie says, dropping the joke good-naturedly as she spatulaes the burnt cookies into the trash. “Well, just you potentially changing all the major relationships in your life on my account. It’s a lot of pressure. Some families don’t react well, and I should have known better than to tell you to come out to yours.”

 

Alex nods, digesting the information. “Does it still scare you that I did?”

 

“Well… yeah. But like you said, it’s about you living your life, right?”

 

She places the cookie sheet on the stove and turns back to Alex.

 

Alex smiles, loving that Maggie can echo her words back to her. She nods. “I’d still be gay even if you hadn’t come to your senses.”

 

Maggie smiles.

 

“So how  _ is _ being out? Other than getting to make out with me all the time.” Maggie’s eyes twinkle and Alex thinks she might have seen an oh-so-subtle wink.

 

“It’s  _ good _ ,” Alex says, emphatic but qualified. “I mean, I worry about things, but not about what other people think anymore.”

 

“Good,” Maggie says, smile still strung up. “Any particular worries I can ease for you?”

 

“Um…” 

 

Alex debates admitting the sex stuff scares her as much as it excites her, but opts not to. It’ll make her look as adolescent as she feels. Plus it’s a weird conversation to have standing in her kitchen.

 

“Just feeling like I’m really… behind.”

 

Maggie tilts her head as though she doesn’t know what Alex means.

 

Alex scoffs and makes a gesture with her hands toward Maggie, as though Maggie’s confidence were an item of clothing.

 

“I don’t think I’ll ever be as confident as you when it comes to dating.”

 

Maggie chews her lip for a minute, then decides to tell Alex something. She lowers her voice and avoids eye contact.

 

“I don’t think anyone ever feels totally confident when it comes to dating. I mean…” She pauses, biting her lip again. “I spend a lot of time thinking about what I could have done differently in the past to avoid getting hurt or hurting other people. I’m just hoping I figure it out before I ruin this.”

 

“ _ Ruin _ this?” Alex says, shocked. “Maggie, how could you-“

 

Maggie does a little wince-frown that makes Alex stop. Maggie’s mind is working through something and Alex knows better now than to talk over it. Sometimes Maggie just needs a minute to figure out how to say something.

 

So Alex waits, and Maggie spins, and finally it comes out.

 

“I guess- there’s always been something I had to hide. In high school I fell in love with my best friend and I had to hide that from her for years. And it hurt.”

 

Alex reaches for Maggie’s hand and holds it to show she’s listening.

 

“And after that, the girls I dated… well, either we were just mismatched or I couldn’t be myself or they didn’t really  _ get _ what I do for a living. They didn’t understand that it’s not just a job where I punch in and punch out. And because of that I felt like I couldn’t talk about work, which is… so much of who I am. It felt like lying to them. I think that’s why none of those relationships worked out.”

 

Alex nods and Maggie keeps talking.

 

“Even when I did find someone who got it, I couldn’t talk about the aliens because that would make me sound  _ insane _ , right? I mean, isn’t that why we don’t hang out with civilians?”

 

Alex nods, realizing Maggie’s understands on every level why it’s so hard to have friends.

 

“I’m used to hiding something or keeping parts of myself separate. All that compartmentalizing makes me feel kind of… blocked. And I don’t want to be like that with you.” Maggie forces her eyes back to Alex and locks in. “Because you  _ do _ get it. And I want to be all here for this. For you.”

 

Maggie stares at Alex intently, that soft-sharp gaze of hers that makes it impossible to look away.

 

Alex can see so much under the surface. Maggie’s not emotionally blocked. She’s just scared no one sees her.

 

And even though their experiences leading here could not be more different, Alex understands exactly what Maggie’s talking about: the fear that if this doesn’t work out, nothing ever will. 

 

“Is there anything you feel like you have to hide now?” Alex asks as gently as she can, hoping Maggie doesn’t hear suspicion or confusion or anything negative. She just wants Maggie to know she heard her.

 

Maggie is quiet in thought for a moment before she shakes her head gently. “Maybe that’s the scary part. Not having anything to hide behind.”

 

“There’s a reason people have nightmares about showing up to work naked.”

 

Maggie chuckles but looks down and Alex realizes making a joke about being naked is a glaring reminder that they haven’t gotten there yet.

 

Alex thinks about the kind of nakedness Maggie’s talking about and realizes she’s got more clothes on than Maggie, and that’s not fair. The kind of intimacy they’re trying to build despite all their fears is what Alex wants. 

 

“It doesn’t have to be all at once,” Alex says gently. Maggie smiles appreciatively, and Alex knows she got something right. They don’t have to race to the finish line. 

 

“I want you to know all the parts of me too. In time, of course,” Alex says. “And, uh…  there’s one thing that I’m not sure how to tell you. And I feel bad I waited until now. But I had to get it cleared…” She tilts her head side to side and rolls her eyes, knowing Maggie understands the tedious procedure of declassifying information, even if this isn’t that kind of declassification.

 

Maggie’s eyes are searching hers and Alex realizes she’s making Maggie nervous.

 

“It’s nothing bad. Hopefully you can laugh about it someday. But, uh… you know how I spend a lot of time with Supergirl?”

 

Maggie nods, hesitant.

 

“And how I spend a lot of time with my sister?”

 

Maggie keeps nodding.

 

Alex winces in anticipation of Maggie’s reaction as she says, “They’re… the same person.”

 

Maggie’s eyebrows lift and her whole face stays frozen for a moment, forehead wrinkled in surprise. 

 

“ _ Oh _ ,” she finally says. “That actually… that makes a lot of sense.”

 

“Yeah?” Alex says, hopeful.

 

“Yeah,” Maggie says, studying the ground while her mind works. 

 

“I’m sorry,” Alex says, desperation creeping into her voice as she starts to ramble. “I wanted to tell you sooner. It’s just, you know, a family secret, and technically classified information. But I don’t want to keep anything from you, especially after what you just- And you were bound to find out sooner or later, with all the time you’ve been spending at my apartment… all the time I hope you still want to spend at my apartment…”

 

Maggie lifts her hand toward Alex to quiet her nervous chattering. “Of course I do.” She holds Alex’s gaze, soft and warm for a minute before she says, playfully, “I have some questions though.”

 

Alex laughs nervously, relieved. “I figured you might.”

 

Maggie slips her hand into Alex’s and guides her to the couch. They sit, wine glasses forgotten on the counter, and Alex relays what it was like to grow up with an alien for a sister, how they drifted apart, how she’s spent her life protecting Kara even when they weren’t on good terms, and how she finally forged a real sisterhood after so many years of trying to sabotage it. Maggie asks questions, fascinated and pained for both Alex and Kara, but mostly she listens. After what could have been hours, Maggie’s hand is still in Alex’s as Maggie tilts forward to kiss Alex, smiling.

 

“Thank you for telling me.” 

 

Something between them is stripped away, leaving them closer than ever.

 

* * *

 

They’re sipping drinks at a gin bar, their usual uncontainable smiles springing between them. Alex is alight with the joy of it; they’ve been dating for two months, and they’re spending as much free time as they have together. Even if it isn’t much some days, it’s life-giving. Alex has so much energy, she barely needs to sleep. Maggie’s smile, Maggie’s laugh, Maggie’s kisses can sustain her for days. 

 

Alex’s wakefulness doesn’t have to do with one thing, though. The thing they’re dancing around, the thing that Alex hopes will be transcendent. She knows they have time, that Maggie is nothing if not patient and methodical. 

 

But Alex has never been patient. She’s never been able to put off until tomorrow what can be done today, whether it be work or play. So she presses the issue, tentatively at first, then firmer, by asking Maggie questions about sex.

 

The more Alex thinks about it, the more she  _ lets _ herself think about it, the more urgent her curiosity and desire become. 

 

She has memorized every kiss Maggie has offered so far, and she’s hungry for more. 

 

“What’s your favorite part of sleeping with a woman?”

 

Everything inside her is spinning in a glorious panic. A thousand disaster scenarios play out in the few seconds it takes Maggie to think about what her favorite part of being with a woman is. Alex is certain she won’t be able to deliver what Maggie wants most.

 

And then Maggie’s answer hits her with such tenderness and softness, Alex is thrown from her orbit. She wonders if her heart is breaking or growing at Maggie’s timid admission.

 

Maggie’s favorite part is after.

 

The holding, the talking in low voices, the kisses that are warm and glowing and soft. All the things Alex never thought she’d want. 

 

She wants them now. So much.

 

Alex realizes there will  _ be _ an after. After they’ve undressed for each other, after they’ve touched the places that make Alex nervous, after they’ve shared all the joy Alex hopes will happen, there will be an after, and Maggie is looking forward to it most of all.

 

Alex thinks past their first time and the world seems to open up to her, to them, to the profundity of all the planets and celestial bodies spinning. 

 

Alex thinks about Maggie glowing afterwards and wants to know what it feels like to hold her with nothing between them.

 

Maggie kisses her and she tugs the kiss into a free fall, then pulls away and tells Maggie to take her home.

 

She’ll give Maggie a before, and a during, but most of all, she’ll give her an after. 

 

They go to Maggie’s, a loft downtown with a view of the river. Maggie is all she can see and feel and hear. Maggie takes her up to her bed, the sheets cool and smooth, and they undress each other with every bit of desire and softness Alex imagined. 

 

Alex  _ wants _ this. Even touch, every sigh, every aroused giggle. She wants to bury her hands in Maggie’s hair and her face in Maggie’s neck. She wants to feel the soft, hot skin of Maggie’s thigh between her own without jeans or pajamas between them. She wants to feel Maggie’s fingers where only her own have been for so long, to see if they hold all the magic she imagines. And she wants to be the one to draw out whatever sighs and groans Maggie will make. 

 

When Maggie slips her hand between Alex’s legs, Alex forgets how to breathe. It’s so light and gentle but she feels  _ so much _ . She surges and tingles and she curls into Maggie, tucking her head between Maggie’s neck and the pillow as she lets out wonderful, disbelieving whine.

 

“You okay?”

 

Alex hears the smile and concern mixed together. 

 

Alex nods. The last thing she wants is for Maggie to stop.

 

Once they start, Alex can’t keep her hips still. Before she always just lay there, receiving whatever efforts were being directed at her. But with Maggie she can hardly control herself. She wants to get as close as possible, to press against her with every inch of her skin, to grind herself on Maggie’s thigh, hip, hand, mouth. If she could blend into her, she would.

 

Excitement and joy reach every corner where doubt remained tucked. She fumbles and laughs and Maggie laughs with her. Their laughs turn to panting and little groans and whines and whimpers. 

 

_ Right there. Oh god. Don’t stop, please don’t stop.  _

 

And they don’t stop, except to catch their breath and stare at each other, almost disbelieving, and then grin and start again and roll through another layer of breathless pleas and sweaty praises.

 

Afterwards she holds Maggie close. It feels as natural as breathing. Maggie’s body, a mystery only a few hours ago, is molded to hers. Alex touches her skin, wondering how she went so long without knowing how warm and soft another person could be. The rise and fall of Maggie’s breath steadies her. She smiles and whispers, drawing out the part Maggie likes best. 

 

She could lay like this for days, glowing and sated and so in love it radiates out her skin.

 

Everything is at peace.

 

Despite every planet in her galaxy rearranging itself, despite the earth flipping upside down, despite Alex not working to keep it in orbit, the world still spins. The world still spins, and she is left in its perfect balance, in Maggie’s arms, knowing with every cell of her body what happiness feels like. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I'd love to hear your thoughts.

**Author's Note:**

> A complementary piece from Maggie's perspective titled "Cliffjumper" will always be posted in conjunction with chapters of this story. You can read just one, but they're stronger together.
> 
> Follow me on tumblr, I'm @lingeringlilies


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